A good, dirty rat Feds praise Blaz donor in cop bribe as sentence looms
He bribed cops. He bought access to Mayor de Blasio. And he was one of the best cooperators Manhattan federal prosecutors have ever seen.
Jona Rechnitz, the notorious police buff and de Blasio donor, received a glowing letter Wednesday from prosecutors ahead of his sentencing for honest services fraud.
“Rechnitz has been, without exaggeration, one of the single most important and prolific white collar cooperating witnesses in the recent history of the Southern District of New York,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Martin Bell wrote in a 51-page document.
The wannabe real estate big shot was the key witness in the cases against his fellow cop-briber, Jeremy Reichberg, former jails union boss Norman Seabrook and hedge fund founder Murray Huberfeld. Rechnitz also played a role in a corruption investigation of the NYPD’s License Division. He cooperated with a federal probe of de Blasio’s fund-raising practices, which resulted in no charges.
“Rechnitz’s cooperation exposed the sordid underbelly of multiple New York City institutions, exposed serious crimes, and held powerful people who fell short of their obligations to the broader public to account,” Bell wrote, noting that Rechnitz met with his office 80 times beginning in 2016.
Prosecutors did not recommend a specific sentence. But they wrote that Rechnitz had been a less problematic and more productive cooperator than crooked Albany lobbyist Todd Howe, who played a critical role in two corruption cases that rocked Gov. Cuomo’s office. Howe was sentenced to five years of probation in April.
Bell wrote that the judge who sentences Rechnitz should not discredit his cooperation because no charges were brought in the de Blasio fund-raising probe, which eyed the mayor’s top fund-raiser, Ross Offinger.
“Rechnitz’s information with respect to his and Reichberg’s involvement with Ross Offinger and Bill de Blasio’s campaign was also useful. That information constituted some, but not all, of the conduct at issue in a broader inquiry as to circumstances in which Mayor de Blasio and others solicited donations from individuals who sought official favors from the City, after which the Mayor or individuals working for him made or directed inquiries to relevant city agencies on behalf of those donors,” the letter read.
“The decision not to charge should not be interpreted as a determination that Rechnitz was not forthcoming.”