Former FDNY Chief Anthony Saccavino pleaded responsible on Wednesday to conspiring to just accept 1000’s of {dollars} in bribes for rushing up inspections for companies with issues earlier than the division.
Saccavino, 59, is accused of expediting fireplace inspections for constructing house owners who may pay up in a scheme that noticed him and his co-conspirators rake in practically $200,000 in unlawful kickbacks.
“I accepted cash in exchange for preferential treatment for entities with business before the Bureau of Fire Prevention,” he admitted in Manhattan Federal Court docket on Wednesday morning.
Saccavino, former chief of the bureau, and one other chief, former Deputy Assistant Chief Brian Cordasco, had been charged with the crimes in September. Cordasco, 49, pleaded responsible a month later to fees he raked in upwards of $5,000 in bribes between 2021 and 2023.
Brian Cordasco is pictured in 2009. (Ken Murray / New York Each day Information)
Bureau of Hearth Prevention, or BFP, is accountable for greenlighting the set up of fireplace security and suppression methods in each industrial and residential buildings, and with out a handed inspection by the BFP, a constructing is probably not allowed to open.
A retired FDNY inspector, Henry Santiago, Jr., who has additionally pleaded responsible to associated fees, helped funnel the ill-gotten positive aspects to them as they stepped in to hurry up inspections after the pandemic, when a backlog of requests had constructed up, in accordance with prosecutors.
Saccavino confessed to only one of many 5 counts he’s charged with — nonetheless denying fees of bribery, conspiracy and wire fraud. Saccavino additionally nonetheless denies that he lied to FBI brokers in an interview.
Outdoors the courtroom, Saccavino’s lawyer, Joseph Caldarera, known as his consumer, who was a primary responder on 9/11, “an American hero,” and mentioned that the responsible plea meant Saccavino “put his family first,” including that not “everything” within the indictment was right.
Saccavino should pay again the $57,000 bribes from the scheme, in accordance with his plea settlement. Whereas the utmost sentence for his crime is 5 years behind bars, the previous chief agreed to not combat any jail time of lower than 60 months.
This scheme occurred on the similar time Mayor Adams’ Metropolis Corridor allegedly labored to fast-track FDNY inspections for actual property builders who had been cozy with the administration, utilizing the so-called “Deputy Mayor of Operations list” — named earlier than it fell underneath the purview of that official.
The unrelated case in opposition to Adams alleges partly that he accepted bribes from associates of the Turkish authorities to bypass fireplace security checks on the nation’s Manhattan consulate.
“Anthony Saccavino betrayed the City agency he was chosen to lead by repeatedly selling access to the Bureau of Fire Prevention’s services in a pay-to-play bribery scheme,” appearing U.S. Lawyer Danielle Sasson mentioned in an announcement.
“This Office will continue to ensure that City officials who place their own interests above those of the public will be held accountable.”
Initially Printed: January 29, 2025 at 12:57 PM EST
