Crooked king of Queens’ comeback
Slasher & ex-con Hiram has a real shot as he takes a stab at council run
H E slashed his girlfriend’s face with a glass shard — and is believed to have driven her past the hospital down the block to another one 14 miles away so he wouldn’t be recognized.
He was accused of misusing city taxpayer funds to fuel his political ambitions — and spent two years in prison for it.
But that hasn’t stopped Hiram Monserrate — a former state senator from Queens who was drummed out of the post over his violent, lawbreaking past — from making a new bid for public office. And he may actually win. “You can’t just look at one season in someone’s life and judge their entire life for that,’’ sniffed the politician-turned-pizza slinger at a Jackson Heights press conference last month, where he was pounding the pave- ment in an attempt to regain his old City Council seat.
Convicted, disgraced and rejected by the leaders of his own Democratic Party, Monserrate amazingly still draws supporters, including even among Republicans, who say he deserves a second chance.
“I support him. And I’m also calling people,’’ said Ruby Muhammad, a Republican who lives in LeFrak City, a massive apartment complex in Monserrate’s district.
Muhammad said she already knows at least 20 other Republican friends who are campaigning for him, too. T HE 50-year-old Monserrate likes to portray himself as a penitent who has owned his ugly past and is ready to leave it behind him.
Few political insiders would deny that he must battle a tidal wave of resistance in the lead-up to next month’s Democratic primary.
After all, many activists, as well as elected officials across the political spectrum, have denounced him for years.
“Someone who has been convicted of domestic violence does not belong in public office,” Jean Bucaria, deputy director of the National Organization for Women’s New York chapter, said while protesting outside one of the candidate’s recent fund-raisers as part of her Stop Monserrate campaign. “If we elect people like this to office, we are basically saying this behavior is OK.’’
But these days, Monserrate’s luck has taken a turn for the better.
In June, the incumbent he was challenging for City Council, heavy favorite Julissa Ferreras-Copeland, suddenly announced she would not seek re-election.
More good fortune came his way when he was endorsed by Bertha Lewis, the activist who heads the left-
leaning Black Institute, a local nonprofit familiar to many of Monserrate’s constituents.
But maybe the biggest thing in Monserrate’s favor is simply LeFrak, which he regularly wooed when he was originally on the council through 2008.
The complex in his district’s southwest corner houses about 25,000 people — 4,683 of whom are active registered Democrats and make up about 11 percent of the district’s 40,192 registered Dems.
“Monserrate will do better in LeFrak,” admitted a prominent Democrat, who is backing the disgraced pol’s primary opponent, Francisco Moya. “When he’s there, he works everyone.”
Sylvia Martin, 68, who has lived in LeFrak for 34 years and is the vice president of its tenants association, dismissed Monserrate’s past as a factor for many of her fellow LeFrak voters.
“Who am I to judge?” she said. “Every one of us has done something. He’s paid the price.”
IT was just a few years ago that Monserrate was peddling $1.25 slices at Papaya Pizza in Corona.
He had been on a downward slide since 2008, when he and then-girlfriend Karla Giraldo got into a violent argument, part of which was caught on a surveillance camera.
During the brawl, Monserrate slashed Giraldo’s face with a shard of broken glass, leaving her with 20 stitches and a black eye. Monserrate was caught on tape then dragging her bleeding through his apartment lobby by her hair.
A year later, he was convicted of misdemeanor assault for the incident but dodged prison as both he and Giraldo claimed that her injuries were an accident.
But Monserrate couldn’t avoid the slammer entirely.
In May 2012, he pleaded guilty to fraud stemming from a scam in which he used city money to fund his jump from City Council to state Senate.
He served two years and now claims that he emerged from prison a changed man.
Last year, he lost a bid for district leader of Corona and East Elmhurst by a mere 57 votes.
Encouraged, he now aims to return to his roots — repping his old Queens council district, which includes Jackson Heights, Flushing, Elmhurst, Corona and College Point. It’s still an uphill battle. Moya certainly has plenty working in his favor.
He has wracked up at least two dozen endorsements, including from Mayor de Blasio, former Mayor David Dinkins and state Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry, who represents LeFrak. Moya also is expected to dominate in South Corona and Jackson Heights.
Moya’s attacks have been particularly withering because there is little need for him to exaggerate.
“I’ll put my record up against his violent, criminal and corrupt past any day of the week,” Moya recently told reporters in Corona.
Monserrate supporters say the local Democratic political machine is “running scared” by pushing the city Board of Elections to move voting machines from LeFrak in an attempt to suppress voter turnout.
The move would force residents who have spent decades voting in LeFrak to hike as far as a mile away to vote in the Sept. 12 primary.
The Monserrate allies Monday said they will file a lawsuit against the board to block the move.
ON paper, Moya is the logical candidate by any standard. He is untarnished by scandal, a stark contrast to his opponent.
But many political watchers agree that Moya’s résumé is thin.
“Hiram did a lot, but he really f--ked up,” a Queens Democrat said. “Moya didn’t f--k up. But he hasn’t done much.”
Some voters said they are frustrated by both candidates. Moya? Monserrate? “No choice,’’ lamented Steve Martone, 57, of Jackson Heights.