Federal prosecutors on Friday dropped bribery and fraud expenses towards former New York Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin, citing the demise of a cooperating witness towards the Democrat who the governor had as soon as chosen to be her second-in-command.
Decide J. Paul Oetken signed an order closing the case towards Benjamin after prosecutors advised him in a letter {that a} assessment of proof within the case led them to conclude they may not show the costs past an affordable doubt after the demise of co-defendant Gerald Migdol.
Migdol died on Feb. 9, 2024. A funeral house obituary on the time supplied no explanation for demise. The Harlem actual property developer had pleaded responsible in 2022, admitting that he organized tens of 1000’s of {dollars} in faux contributions from 2019 to 2021 as Benjamin campaigned to be metropolis comptroller, a race he misplaced.
Benjamin resigned as lieutenant governor after his April 2022 arrest.
“At present’s vindication of Brian Benjamin is a well timed reminder of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.’s well-known phrases: ‘The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,’” Benjamin’s attorneys mentioned in an announcement on Friday.
Protection attorneys Barry Berke, Dani James and Darren LaVerne mentioned they “all the time believed this present day would come.”
The arrest created a political disaster for Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul after she had chosen Benjamin as her second-in-command.
She took the state’s high elected submit after a sexual harassment scandal drove from workplace her predecessor, Democrat Andrew Cuomo.
Benjamin beforehand had served within the state Legislature, representing most of central Harlem.
The case towards Benjamin had not gone easily for prosecutors earlier than Migdol’s demise.
In December 2022, Oetken tossed out the bribery and fraud expenses, leaving solely data falsification expenses towards Benjamin.
In a written opinion, Oetken wrote that prosecutors did not allege an express instance wherein Benjamin supplied a favor for a bribe, a vital aspect of bribery and trustworthy companies fraud expenses.
Final March, nevertheless, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court docket of Appeals in Manhattan reinstated the costs, saying an indictment within the case “sufficiently alleged an explicit quid pro quo.”
The appeals courtroom mentioned a jury might infer from details within the case that Benjamin promised to allocate $50,000 in state funds to a nonprofit group managed by Migdol in return for marketing campaign contributions from the developer.
On the time, Berke mentioned on his consumer’s behalf that the “facts are clear that Mr. Benjamin did nothing other than engage in routine fundraising and support a nonprofit providing needed resources to Harlem public schools.”
The Supreme Court docket had just lately declined to listen to an attraction of the 2nd Circuit’s choice.
A spokesperson for prosecutors declined to remark Friday.
