Baby, my pals have badges
Brooklyn businessman Jeremy Reichberg — accused of bribing some of the city’s top cops — used his NYPD ties to woo his mistress, according to prosecutors.
Reichberg’s ex-lover, Tara Sheils, will be called as a witness in the ongoing case against him and Deputy Inspector James Grant, prosecutors revealed in a letter filed Monday in Manhattan Federal Court.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Martin Bell wrote that prosecutors need to tell the jury that the married Reichberg was having an affair because he “used his police connections” to impress the woman. Prosecutors only referred to Sheils as “Witness-1,” but separate court filings by Reichberg’s attorney identified her.
“The evidence will show that Reichberg used his ability to secure favors from the police as a means of impressing Witness-1 and courting Witness-1 romantically,” Bell wrote.
Little has emerged about Sheils, who will testify in the trial entering its second week. Prosecutors have said only that she was briefly Reichberg’s nurse when he was recovering from surgery and that they had an affair.
Reichberg is accused of giving Grant gifts. In exchange, the cop would do him favors to make him look like a big shot, prosecutors say.
Bell wrote that Reichberg got cops to chauffeur the woman on a “purely personal errand on at least one occasion.”
Reichberg allegedly had then-Deputy Chief Michael Harrington give Sheils his business card and cell phone number in case she ever needed anything.
She also visited NYPD headquarters with Reichberg to meet Harrington and disgraced ex-Chief of Department Philip Banks, Bell wrote. The couple attended a promotions ceremony for Detective Michael Milici, who has since been fired, according to the letter.
Reichberg attorney Susan Necheles has asked that the jury be told he and Sheils were only “close personal friends.” Necheles wrote in court papers she would not dispute that he and Sheils had a “close personal relationship.” She previously vowed to not question witnesses about Reichberg’s sex life.
“It would materially alter the character of Witness-1’s testimony to attempt to describe Reichberg’s conduct here as a mere ‘friendship,’” Bell wrote.