Handled Lawmaker And City-Time Cases
The city Department of Investigation (DOI) released its 2012 annual report on New Year’s Eve, highlighting a prolific year of significant investigations, financial recoveries, and arrests for the city’s anti-corruption agency.
In 2012, DOI’s investigations reflected the agency’s unique and integral role within city government: protecting taxpayer funds, strengthening city procedures, and exposing and stopping corruption.
The agency’s investigations also led to noteworthy convictions and sentences that delivered a definitive message of deterrence.
In 2012, the agency:
– Arrested 834 individuals on an array of corruption charges, including evading city regulations through bribery, filing false information that weakens important city data, and diverting city funds for personal benefit. This year’s arrests surpassed last year’s 731 arrests, a 14 percent increase; and is more than double the number of arrests in 2002.
– Recovered $500 million from the prime vendor on the CityTime project to repay the city for overcharges resulting from vendor fraud on the project, an unprecedented result.
– Received more than 12,200 complaints, 29 percent more than the approximately 9,470 received in 2002.
– Closed out more than 1,370 cases, 61 percent more than the approximately 850 cases closed in 2002.
– Issued 342 policy and procedure recommendations to city agencies, 15 agencies more than the 297 issued in 2011. These recommendations are part of the more than 2,960 issued since 2002, most of which have been adopted.
– Conducted more than 350 corruption prevention lectures, which establish a direct link to the DOI and put a face to the agency. Since 2002, the DOI has presented nearly 5,000 of these lectures.
– Conducted more than 43,000 vendor vets in 2012, which provide facts to city agencies awarding contracts, so they can determine whether the vendors are responsible to receive city contracts. By virtue of these DOI vets, the city can also require changes or corrective action plans from the vendor as it relates to governance and fiscal controls.
“As DOI prepares to mark its 140th anniversary in 2013, it contin- ues to play a vital role in the good governance of this city,” DOI Commissioner Rose Gill Hearn said. “In the past decade, DOI has broken new ground in corruption fighting, exposing fraud involving city-funded nonprofits, improving city operations by remedying vulnerabilities found during investigations, and recovering millions of dollars for the city’s taxpayers. There is no other integrity agency with DOI’s broad jurisdiction or knowledge of city operations.
The DOI’s 2012 investigations include:
– Rapid Repairs: the DOI is actively monitoring the city’s Rapid Repairs Program, an innovative effort to restore power, heat, and hot water to residences damaged by Hurricane Sandy.
The DOI helped the city protect the program’s integrity by vetting the credentials of the licensed professionals involved, conducting emergency reviews of the six prime vendors and dozens of subcontractors, and choosing integrity monitors- who report to the DOI-to oversee the contractors’ work and prevent fraud, waste, and abuse.
In addition, the DOI published a hot line specifically for fraud complaints involving city-related Hurri- cane Sandy recovery efforts.
– A Message of Deterrence: a DOI investigation conducted jointly with the Bronx District Attorney’s Office into misconduct on the part of former NYPD Commissioner Bernard Kerik ended this month with the conviction of Peter DiTommaso.
DiTommaso was convicted on first degree perjury charges for lying to the grand jury investigating Kerik regarding whether DiTommaso’s company, Interstate, or a subsidiary, improperly paid for substantial renovations to Kerik’s home.
The jury’s verdict, which concluded a lengthy investigation into failed efforts to conceal Kerik’s corrupt behavior, reflects the DOI’s continuing commitment to pursue corruption wherever it exists in, or affects, city government.
– Construction Safety Cards: DOI investigators conducted undercover investigations, and a two-week sweep of construction sites, which resulted in the confiscation of more than 70 fraudulent safety cards and more than 40 arrests.
The joint sweep was conducted with the city Department of Buildings (DOB) and led to partial and full stop work orders issued at more than a dozen sites for a variety of violations.
– Identifying Corruption Gaps: Among recommendations adopted by city agencies as a result of DOI investigations were increased monitoring of restaurant letter grade cards, more stringent controls of munimeter receipts and reviews of practices by the Sanitation and Parks Departments.
– Exposing Fraudulent Filings: the DOI has focused on unco vering and stopping false information from penetrating city records, since it weakens the city’s ability to render informed decisions, many which affect the public’s safety.
To that end, in 2012, DOI investigators shut down a forgery operation and arrested the creator of bogus government-issued documents that included fake FDNY Certificates of Fitness and state drivers’ licenses; worked with the city Health Department to uncover an unlicensed day care operator who impersonated a licensee after her own license was revoked when two children in her care were injured; day care program was closed; arrested eight individuals who submitted false Social Security numbers and other personal information to obtain licenses illegally from the city; and conducted investigations that led to the arrests of three former Child Protective Specialists with the City Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) who were charged with filing false reports in connection with child welfare investigations.
– Shutting Down Bribery Schemes: the DOI has remained vigilant in this area of concern, arresting not only the city employee who accepts a bribe, but the individual who offers it to evade city rules.
In 2012, the DOI’s bribery cases included a former project manager for DPR convicted of accepting bribes in a bid-rigging scheme for a Bronx playground contract; a Correction Officer charged with receiving $1,200 in bribes to smuggle illegal drugs and purported drugs into a Rikers Island jail; and more than a dozen arrests of individuals who attempted to corrupt city officials through bribes in unsuccessful efforts to evade buildings, health, and other cityregulations.
– Curtailing Housing Fraud: A core initiative at the DOI has been to protect limited public housing dollars and preserve public housing apartments for eligible tenants.
This sustained effort has led to nearly 700 housing fraud arrests associated with approximately $15 million in theft of government funds since 2002.
In three cases, DOI’s investigations stopped ongoing crimes after the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) was defrauded of more than $150,000.
– High-Impact Results on DOI Investigations: DOI investigations led to a series of dispositions that delivered powerful messages of deterrence including the jury conviction of City Councilman Larry Seabrook on wire fraud, mail fraud and conspiracy charges, as well as the two-year prison sentence for former New York State Senator and City Council Member Hiram Monserrate for mail fraud and conspiracy relating to the misuse of more than $100,000 in City Council discretionary funds that went to finance his failed state Senate campaign.
In addition, City Fire Department Supervising inspector Carlos Montoya was jailed on a federal bribery charge for his role in a massive scheme to defraud a city-administered program that subsidizes day care costs for low-income parents who work. DOI’s investigation so far has resulted in convictions of six city employees and eight day care operators.
DOI’s investigation that uncovered fraud by the consultants implementing the city’s computerized timekeeping system (CityTime) led to an unprecedented recovery of $466 million from Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), the prime contractor, which also waived $40 million still owed by the city. The half-billion dollar recovery repaid the city for losses resulting from fraud in the project and is in addition to the ongoing criminal case that has resulted in charges against one company and 11 individuals, two of whom have entered guilty pleas.
Criminal complaints and indictments are accusations. Defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty.
