Alain Kaloyeros, the president of Polytechnic, is also charged.
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Former state Sen. Vincent Leibell, of Putnam County, served 18 months in prison after being convicted of federal corruption charges.
Kaloyeros has been suspended without pay. “He committed no crimes along the way”.
Not only did Percoco help Cuomo hammer out issues on legislation such as getting Republican support for gay marriage in 2011, he also intervened in local issues where necessary, such as smoothing over concerns about Nik Wallenda’s internationally broadcast June 2012 tightrope walk over the Horseshoe Falls. Laipple, Schuler and Ciminelli were released after court appearances Thursday, and their lawyers said they’re innocent. They also used “fat man” to refer to Kelly. Their attorneys say all are innocent.
Authorities accused Percoco of conspiring with Kaloyeros and Howe to rid bidding in the Buffalo Billion project and deceive Fort Schuyler, the state-funded entity awarding the lucrative contracts, so they would go to Syracuse-based COR Development and Buffalo contractor LPCiminelli. LPCiminelli said company officials “acted appropriately and legally” and will be vindicated.
Neither Kaloyeros nor his attorney has returned messages seeking comment.
Read profiles of Percoco, Howe, Kaloyeros and Nicolla, plus six additional individuals named in the federal case. “If it turns out that his closest adviser was gaming the system for his personal enrichment, it strikes at the heart of how the governor describes his own administration”, Blair Horner, the executive director of the New York Public Interest Research Group, said.
Cuomo says breaches of public integrity will be punished. Percoco “will enter a plea of not guilty because he is not guilty”.
Prosecutors also said Todd Howe, a lobbyist and a former strategic adviser to Cuomo when he was secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, pleaded guilty to charges filed on Tuesday and is cooperating with the investigation.
Responding to the charges, Cuomo said in a statement: “If the allegations are true, I am saddened and profoundly disappointed”.
Percoco’s attorney, Barry Bohrer, called the case “an overreach of classic proportions”. The instrument for doing this was the Fort Schuyler Management Company-an offshoot of SUNY Polytechnic, an arm of the governor’s under-performing START-UP NY program and a handler of construction contracts in the Buffalo Billion initiative.
Howe faces eight charges, including conspiracy, wire fraud and extortion.
Lisa Toscano-Percoco, who is married to former top gubernatorial aide Joseph Percoco, allegedly snagged a $90,000-a-year, “no-show” job with energy firm Competitive Power Ventures, in exchange for her powerful hubby’s influence in Albany.
The Governor’s economic development plan for Upstate New York is at the center of the probe, which targets former top aide Joseph Percoco and numerous others – including two COR executives, Steven Aiello and Joseph Gerardi.
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in NY will hold a news conference later Thursday on the charges, according to a statement issued by his office.
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New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, right, talks with Alain Kaloyeros, senior vice president and chief executive officer of the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering at the University at Albany, in 2013.
