N.Y. man charged with bribing police as corruption probe continues
Source: Reuters
N.Y. man charged with bribing police as corruption probe continues
By Joseph Ax and Nate Raymond
April 18, 2016
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A member of a volunteer safety patrol in an Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn was charged on Monday with trying to bribe police officers to obtain gun licenses, prosecutors said, in the latest fallout from a wide-ranging corruption probe into the New York City Police Department.
A criminal complaint filed in Manhattan federal court charged Alex Lichtenstein, 44, with conspiracy and bribery, saying he bragged about having obtained 150 licenses through his NYPD connections.
Those statements were recorded by another officer whom Lichtenstein last week offered to pay $6,000 per license application that he could get through the department's license division, prosecutors said. The complaint said Lichtenstein told the officer he tried to bribe that he charged community members thousands of dollars to help them obtain licenses through his NYPD connections.
Lichtenstein was "no less than an arms dealer for the community of New York City," assistant U.S. attorney Kan Nawaday said in court.
Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/news/n-y-man-charged-bribing-police-corruption-probe-002410939.html?nhp=1
Renew Deal
(81,861 posts)csziggy
(34,136 posts)By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUMAPRIL 18, 2016
A member of a volunteer security force in Borough Park, Brooklyn, was charged on Monday with offering bribes to New York Police Department officials to obtain handgun permits the first arrest directly linked to the widening federal investigation into police corruption and Mayor Bill de Blasios fund-raising efforts.
The man, Alex Lichtenstein, 44, was arrested on Sunday at his home in Pomona, N.Y., by agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and detectives from the Police Departments Internal Affairs Bureau, officials said. A criminal complaint unsealed on Monday in United States District Court in Manhattan charged him with bribery and conspiracy to commit bribery.
Deputy Inspector Michael T. Endall, who heads the Police Departments License Division, was one of three men transferred from that division on Monday, a statement from the department said. Inspector Endall was reassigned to an administrative position pending further review; Sgt. David Villanueva and Officer Richard Ochetal were placed on modified assignment, and have also been transferred.
Mr. Lichtenstein tried to bribe an officer to help him obtain pistol licenses, offering him $6,000 per license and telling him he had already obtained an estimated 150 permits over the last year through his connections at the License Division, a claim the officer secretly recorded, the complaint said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/19/nyregion/brooklyn-man-accused-of-improperly-obtaining-handgun-licenses.html