Indictment unsealed against NYC Mayor Eric Adams

NEW YORK - New York Mayor Eric Adams was charged with bribery, wire fraud and seeking illegal campaign donations in a federal indictment unsealed Thursday – a lengthy list of accusations that grew out of what prosecutors called “corrupt relationships” with rich foreigners.

For nearly a decade, the indictment charged, Adams “sought and accepted improper valuable benefits, such as luxury international travel, including from wealthy foreign businesspeople and at least one Turkish government official seeking to gain influence over him.”

The 57-page indictment charges that those corrupt relationships dated to Adams’s time as the Brooklyn borough president. It says his rise in big city politics was fueled in part by a criminal scheme to take expensive gifts of travel and hotel stays, as well as illegal campaign money.

By September 2021, federal prosecutors say, the unnamed Turkish official told Adams that it was “his turn to repay” the official, by pressuring the city fire department to speed up the opening of a new Turkish consular building in time for a visit by Turkey’s president.

“In exchange for free travel and other travel-related bribes in 2021 and 2022 arranged by the Turkish official, Adams did as instructed,” the indictment charges. “Because of Adams’ pressure … the FDNY official responsible for the FDNY’s assessment of the skyscraper’s fire safety was told that he would lose his job if he failed to acquiesce and, after Adams intervened, the skyscraper opened as requested by the Turkish Official.”

For more than a year, the investigation of Adams has been drawing closer and closer to him, leading to the charges Thursday.

The same morning, federal agents searched the mayor’s official residence, Gracie Mansion, and seized his phone and electronic devices, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a sensitive process.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney Damian Williams and representatives of other agencies held a news conference to announce the charges.

“Year after year after year, he kept the public in the dark” about the gifts “he was secretly being showered with,” Williams said.

When it came to illegal foreign donations, Williams said, “Adams directed his staff to pursue this foreign money.”

Adams, who served as a New York City police officer for years before becoming a politician, was defiant in the face of the charges, vowing not to resign while he fights them.

“I’m the mayor of the city of New York,” he said during a news conference. “From here, my attorneys will take care of the case so I can take care of the city. My day-to-day will not change. I will continue to do the job for 8.3 million New Yorkers that I was elected to do.”

The mayor insisted he was innocent.

“If it’s campaign violations, I know I don’t violate the campaign. If it’s foreign donors, I know I don’t take money from foreign donors,” he said.

Alex Spiro, a lawyer for Adams, criticized agents for their arrival at the mayor’s residence Thursday morning.

“Federal agents appeared this morning at Gracie Mansion in an effort to create a spectacle (again) and take Mayor Adams phone (again). He has not been arrested and looks forward to his day in court,” Spiro said in an email. “They send a dozen agents to pick up a phone when we would have happily turned it in.”

Adams’s administration has had a flurry of high-profile resignations in recent weeks, including from his former police commissioner Edward Caban, whose devices were collected by federal authorities for examination. Caban’s home was searched by investigators who also targeted his brother, James Caban, a former police officer, according to other individuals with knowledge of investigative efforts who spoke on the condition of anonymity to confirm a sensitive process.

Other upper-level members of Adams’s administration faced similar searches.

Last year, the mayor’s phones were seized by federal agents who were looking for potential ties between his campaign and the Turkish government. The Brooklyn home of Adams campaign worker Brianna Suggs was also searched around that time.

Investigations have intensified around the Adams administration in recent months. Prosecutors are scrutinizing whether James Caban pressured city businesses to hire him in exchange for the promise of favors. Other aspects of the probes are unclear, as federal authorities have said little about them, while investigators search homes, phones and financial records.

In recent weeks, interim police commissioner Thomas Donlon’s homes were searched by federal agents shortly after he was to take over the nation’s largest police force. But that investigation appears to involve past activity unrelated to the department.

Lisa Zornberg, Adams’s chief counsel, resigned suddenly this month, saying that she could “no longer effectively serve.”

Adams and his team have maintained that City Hall and the city’s operations have been unharmed by recent events.

The investigations have explored the conduct of senior mayoral aides, those aides’ relatives, and campaign fundraising.

Adams suggested in his statement that his advocacy for the city is what led to his legal troubles. “I always knew that if I stood my ground for all of you that I would become a target, and a target I became,” Adams said.