“I learned this morning of the charges filed by the U.S. Attorney’s office that include a former member of my administration”. Bharara’s office has secured convictions against the former leaders of both state houses, however he’s made it abundantly clear that his primary target is the executive branch. In another wrinkle that could have come from Mafia fiction, Percoco called one of his alleged co-conspirators “Fat Boy” and “Fat Man”, according to the complaint. Percoco also worked for Cuomo’s father, Gov. Mario Cuomo.
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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.
Kaloyeros masterminded much of Cuomo’s vast upstate economic development programs.
“Behind the scenes they were cynically rigging the whole process”, said Bharara.
Questions had circled whether Percoco represented clients who had business before the state as part of the Buffalo Billion. Bharara announced that Howe pleaded guilty to an 8 count indictment, and is now a cooperating witness in the case.
Competitive’s public relations representative, Peter Galbraith Kelly, COR President Steven Aiello, and another COR executive, Joseph Gerardi, are also being charged. That led to emails such as one where Howe wrote that Percoco needed to hold an official’s feet to the fire “to keep the ziti flowing”. In a brief statement, Cuomo said that he is “saddened and profoundly disappointed” by the man who served two generations of his political family. Cuomo has distanced himself from Percoco and Howe since the spring, when word of the federal probe got out.
“The situations that are laid out in the complaint were breathtaking to me when I read them”, Cuomo said following an expansion announcement at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery.
The indictments cast a huge cloud over Cuomo’s upstate initiative, involving big-ticket projects in Buffalo, Dunkirk, Rochester, Syracuse, Utica and Albany.
“There are no allegations of any wrongdoing or misconduct by the governor anywhere in this complaint”, Bharara said.
Bharara also said that the charges speak to a systemic problem of corruption: “This is big-time stuff that goes to the core of how I think state government operates”.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman will hold a separate conference at 2:30 p.m.to announce public corruption charges as well. COR finds itself accused of passing Percoco another $35,000 to get the Empire State Economic Development Corporation-a Cuomo-controlled entity-to pay it for building a parking lot servicing a hotel in Syracuse, despite the hotel not having reached a required labor agreement.
The felony complaint alleges that Kaloyeros steered, or agreed to steer, the awarding of contracts to handpicked companies, including Nicolla’s Columbia Development.
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Canestrari dealt with Kaloyeros as part of his work in the state legislature, specifically around the time when he said the SUNY Polytechnic Institute president only had a vision of turning the Capital Region into a high tech area.
