Six people were indicted on Friday for allegedly using straw donors to illegally generate donations to Mayor Eric Adams’ 2021 campaign under a generous taxpayer-funded matching funds program.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said the defendants’ concocted a scheme in which they organized fundraisers and illegally recruited and used straw donors: individuals who were given money to contribute to Adams’ campaign in their own name so as to circumvent contribution limits and exploit the city’s matching funds system.
Adams has not been charged with any wrongdoing.
Bragg accused the defendants — Dwayne Montgomery, Shamsuddin Riza, Millicent Redick, Ronald Peek, Yahya Mushtaq and Shahid Mushtaq — of trying to use their contributions as a way of gaining access and influence with City Hall.
Montgomery, who is said to have led the effort, is a retired NYPD inspector listed as a “director of integrity” for the Teamsters Local 237, a union representing city employees.
He was suspended Friday, according to Hank Sheinkopf, a spokesperson for the union, who added that the Teamsters had no knowledge of his alleged activity.
The scheme allegedly involved a Democratic party official, with one of the straw donors described in the indictment an unidentified “Manhattan Democratic Party District Leader.” There are over 70 such elected officials in the borough. Their duties include nominating judges and picking poll workers.
“We allege a deliberate scheme to game the system in a blatant attempt to gain power,” Bragg said in a press release. “The New York City Campaign Finance Board program is meant to support our democracy and amplify the voices of New York City voters. When the integrity of that program is corrupted, all New Yorkers suffer.”
The charges include conspiracy, grand larceny and offering a false instrument for filing.
Several of the defendants have contracting businesses and were said to be eyeing contracts with the city.
According to the…
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