The corruption charges expected to be announced against several associates and supporters of the New York City mayor, Eric Adams, this week are the latest in a multitude of scandals plaguing his administration as he mounts a long-shot bid for re-election.
Mr. Adams is not expected to be charged, but four people with knowledge of the matter said that a number of his close allies would be: his former chief adviser and close friend, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, and her son, Glenn Martin II; Jesse Hamilton, a former state senator and friend of the mayor’s; and two influential supporters, Gina and Tony Argento.
A swirl of criminal cases, corruption investigations and allegations of misconduct have tarnished the mayoralty of Mr. Adams, a Democrat who took office in 2022 and is running as an independent in November. These legal troubles, including federal corruption charges against the mayor himself that were later abandoned by the Trump Justice Department, caused chaos in the city government, tanked the mayor’s approval ratings and alienated many Democrats.
In the mayoral race, Mr. Adams is polling around the single digits, lagging behind Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee; former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who is also running as an independent; and Curtis Sliwa, the Republican candidate.
Here is a guide to the legal and political quagmires involving the mayor and his associates.
The mayor’s criminal indictment
Mr. Adams became the first sitting mayor in the modern history of New York City to face criminal charges when he was accused last fall of abusing his office to obtain free and discounted travel and illegal foreign campaign contributions.
Federal prosecutors charged him in a five-count indictment with conspiracy, wire fraud, bribery and soliciting illegal campaign contributions from foreign nationals.
Prosecutors said the illegal activity dated to 2014, when Mr. Adams became Brooklyn borough president. They said the scheme centered on currying favor with Turkish officials and businesspeople while accepting at least $123,000 in flight upgrades and airline tickets.
In exchange, prosecutors said, Mr. Adams pressured the Fire Department to speed the approval of a new Turkish consulate in Midtown Manhattan. Prosecutors said he also received foreign contributions from wealthy foreign donors who were not legally permitted to give to his campaign — “straw” donations that allowed Mr. Adams to fraudulently obtain millions of dollars in public matching funds.
Mr. Adams pleaded not guilty and said the case was a politically motivated act of retribution because he had criticized the Biden administration for its handling of the migrant crisis.
The charges are dropped at the behest of Trump’s Justice Department
The criminal indictment of Mr. Adams became an even more explosive issue earlier this year when the Trump administration successfully sought to have the corruption charges dropped. It said a criminal prosecution of the mayor would impede his ability to assist the federal government’s mass deportation program.
The request, which came after the mayor spent months cozying up to the president, set off an extraordinary clash between federal prosecutors in Manhattan, who had brought the case, and Justice Department officials in Washington.
It ultimately led to the resignation of the acting U.S. attorney in Manhattan, Danielle R. Sassoon, and several other prosecutors. In her resignation letter, Ms. Sassoon said that at a meeting in Washington with federal prosecutors, Mr. Adams’s lawyers had “repeatedly urged what amounted to a quid pro quo.”
Emil Bove III, who at the time was a top Justice Department official and had issued the order to the Manhattan prosecutors, then signed a formal request asking the judge, Dale E. Ho of Federal District Court in Manhattan, to dismiss the case. The law gives judges almost no ability to refuse a government request to drop criminal charges, and Judge Ho granted the request in April. He nevertheless criticized the Justice Department’s stated arguments for abandoning the case and said “everything here smacks of a bargain.”
The episode led to widespread calls for Mr. Adams’s resignation and dealt a blow to his standing in the Democratic Party, in whose mayoral primary he declined to participate in June. Mr. Adams has denied that there was any quid pro quo.
Inquiries into other City Hall officials and allies of the mayor
Mr. Adams is just one of many people in and around City Hall to be swept up in federal investigations recently. And while he may have escaped the specter of prosecution, others in his orbit remain under investigation or have pleaded guilty.
By last winter, the various inquiries had led to numerous high-level resignations within the Adams administration, prompting critics to ask who was running the city.
Last year, federal agents seized cellphones from the schools chancellor, David C. Banks; the first deputy mayor, Sheena Wright; the deputy mayor for public safety, Philip Banks III; and a close confidant and adviser to Mr. Adams, Timothy Pearson.
The seizures were part of an investigation into a possible bribery scheme involving a firm run by Terence Banks, the younger brother of the schools chancellor and the deputy mayor for public safety. David and Philip Banks, Ms. Wright and Mr. Pearson all resigned after those searches were conducted; none have been charged with wrongdoing.
Federal agents were also investigating whether the police commissioner at the time, Edward A. Caban, and his twin brother, James Caban, a former police officer who owned a nightclub security business, were involved in a scheme to provide favors to nightclubs in exchange for illegal payments. The police commissioner resigned in September at the request of City Hall after federal agents seized his phone.
The mayor’s director of Asian affairs, Winnie Greco, also resigned last fall after federal agents searched homes she owned. Ms. Greco is also a prominent campaign fund-raiser with close ties to the government of China, although the focus of the investigation into her remains unclear.
On Wednesday, Ms. Greco, who had returned to Mr. Adams’s re-election campaign as a volunteer, was suspended after The City, an online news organization, reported that she had handed more than $100 in cash stuffed in a potato-chip bag to one of its reporters after a campaign event. When the reporter sought to return the money, Ms. Greco apologized profusely, saying she had made a mistake and that “it’s a culture thing,” The City reported. Ms. Greco’s lawyer, Steven Brill, said that it is common in Chinese culture to give cash to reporters “in a gesture of friendship and gratitude.”
Mr. Adams’s campaign spokesman, Todd Shapiro, said the campaign was shocked by the report and that Ms. Greco “has been suspended from all volunteer campaign-related activities.” He added that Mr. Adams has “always demanded the highest ethical and legal standards.”
Mr. Adams’s former senior liaison to the Muslim community, Mohamed Bahi, was charged last year with witness tampering and destruction of evidence in connection with the corruption investigation into the mayor. Mr. Bahi pleaded guilty last week, months after the charges against Mr. Adams were dropped; his sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 18.
Earlier this year, one of Mr. Adams’s donors, Erden Arkan, a Turkish American businessman who was accused of making illegal campaign donations, also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He was sentenced this month to one year of probation.
Last December, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, the top Adams aide who is expected to face new charges this week, was charged with corruption alongside her son, Glenn Martin II. Prosecutors accused them of taking bribes from businessmen in exchange for intervening with city regulators on their behalf; both Ms. Lewis-Martin and Mr. Martin pleaded not guilty.
Ms. Lewis-Martin’s phones had been seized in September along with a phone belonging to Mr. Hamilton, the former state senator whom Mr. Adams installed in a powerful city job and who is also expected to face charges this week. A lawyer for Mr. Hamilton, Mark Pollard, said his client “maintains that he is not guilty of whatever allegations are in this indictment.”
Sexual misconduct allegations
Mr. Adams and two former high-ranking officials in his administration have also been accused of sexual misconduct.
Last year, a woman who said she had worked with Mr. Adams in New York City’s Transit Police Department filed a lawsuit that accused him of asking her for oral sex in exchange for career help in 1993 and then sexually assaulting her when she refused. That lawsuit also names the Police Department and the Guardians Association, a fraternal organization of Black police officers that Mr. Adams helped lead at the time, as defendants.
Mr. Adams has strenuously denied the allegations, saying, “I don’t recall ever meeting this person.”
Timothy Pearson, the top Adams aide whose phone was seized by federal agents, faced four sexual harassment lawsuits last year, including one that said he was so prone to harassing women that he was placed under watch to keep him from being alone with female colleagues. Mr. Pearson, who had a broad portfolio that included public safety and dealing with contracts for migrant shelters, resigned last fall. Mr. Pearson’s lawyer, Hugh H. Mo, said in a statement at the time that recent news reports had contained “false and defamatory allegations” against his client and that Mr. Pearson was “committed to clearing his name,” though he did not single out a specific report or otherwise provide details.
And Jeffrey Maddrey, a longtime friend of the mayor, resigned as the Police Department’s highest-ranking uniformed officer last December after he was accused of sexually abusing at least three female officers over several years. Mr. Maddrey denied the allegations through his lawyer, who described the accusers as “embittered subordinates.”
Former police officials sue Mr. Adams, alleging corruption and criminality
Last month, five former top police officials accused Mr. Adams of wrongdoing in his management of the Police Department.
First, four former high-ranking officers sued the mayor, accusing him of enabling corruption in the department. The officers included respected department veterans who had helped lead bureaus like Internal Affairs and Professional Standards, and their complaint portrayed the department as governed by chaos and cronyism.
Kayla Mamelak Altus, a spokeswoman for Mr. Adams, said at the time that the administration would review the lawsuits, but suggested that a drop in the city’s crime rate indicated the department was well run.
Shortly afterward, a second lawsuit was filed by Thomas G. Donlon, a former F.B.I. official who became interim police commissioner after Mr. Caban’s resignation. Mr. Donlon accused Mr. Adams of running City Hall and the Police Department as a criminal enterprise.
In his suit, Mr. Donlon said he had “uncovered systemic corruption and criminal conduct being perpetrated by the N.Y.P.D.’s leadership” during his tenure in the department. He resigned last year, just weeks into the job, after federal agents searched his home for classified documents in an unrelated investigation.
Ms. Mamelak Altus called Mr. Donlon’s claims “baseless accusations from a disgruntled former employee” and said his lawsuit was “nothing more than an attempt to seek compensation at the taxpayer’s expense after Mr. Donlon was rightfully removed from the role of interim police commissioner.”
Adams campaign sues city agency over denial of public matching funds
Questions about the mayor’s campaign finances have also cast a shadow over his re-election bid.
The city runs a generous program that provides qualifying candidates with an eight-for-one match of small-dollar donations, but the New York City Campaign Finance Board has repeatedly blocked Mr. Adams from accessing that money.
The board initially denied Mr. Adams’s request for public funds after his indictment. In May, Mr. Adams sued the board, noting that the charges had been dropped. That lawsuit was dismissed by a federal judge who said Mr. Adams had failed to provide some of the requested information and had been late to inform the court about conflicts of interest.
In July, the board issued another denial, saying Mr. Adams had still not provided necessary information about his fund-raising efforts, including the campaign’s interactions with Turkish business interests.
Earlier this month, the board again denied the mayor matching funds, saying it believed that his campaign had provided “incomplete and misleading” information and had violated the law. The board did not provide details about its findings, but said the decision was based on “all of the available evidence, including but not limited to its own independent investigation.”
Mr. Shapiro called the decision “vague and unsubstantiated” as well as “deeply concerning and potentially damaging.”
Liam Stack is a Times reporter who covers the culture and politics of the New York City region.
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