Indictment and conviction of former assembly speaker Sheldon Silver, 2015
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| Sheldon Silver Former New York Assemblyman |
| Status |
| Next court date |
In early 2015, New York Assemblyman Sheldon Silver was indicted on five counts of bribery, extortion and conspiracy. He pleaded not guilty to one count of honest services mail fraud, one count of honest services wire fraud and one count of using his office for extortion.[1] In April, federal prosecutors filed a new criminal charge against Silver: engaging in monetary transactions involving crime proceeds.[2] On November 30, 2015, Silver was found guilty on all seven counts and was removed from office.[3] He was sentenced on May 3, 2016, to 12 years in prison.[4] His conviction was overturned on July 13, 2017.[5]
Background
In late December 2014, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal wrote a series of articles on the federal investigation into multiple payments made to Silver from a New York law firm. Both websites cited a source close to the investigation.[6] The law firm in question, Goldberg & Iryami, is a small law firm that, "seeks real estate tax reductions for commercial and residential properties in New York City."[7] Prosecutors and agents of the F.B.I. discovered that the law firm Goldberg & Iryami issued payments to Silver for the past decade, but that he did he not list that income on his annual financial disclosure forms.[7] Jay Goldberg told the Wall Street Journal, that "Nothing illicit is going on here."[8]
In his professional life, Silver is a personal-injury lawyer and has acted as "of counsel" for the law firm Weitz & Luxenberg.[8] In 2013, Silver said that he made from $650,000 to $750,000 from outside work including, though not limited to Weitz & Luxenberg. This was in addition to his $121,000 Assembly salary.[8] It is unclear what kind of work that Silver did for the personal-injury law firm. As a personal-injury lawyer, Silver was not known to have any expertise in the area of law in which Goldberg & Iryami practices.[7]
The investigation into Silver came out of the work of the Moreland Commission, a state ethics commission created by Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), to identify corruption in state politics.[6] The Moreland Commission was disbanded in March 2014 after Cuomo made a deal to secure the state's budget that included tougher laws on bribery, corruption and improved enforcement of election law. U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara publicly criticized the decommissioning of the commission and took the remaining files from the panel and vowed to complete its work.[9]
Arrest
| December 2014: NYT and WSJ write articles accusing Silver |
| January 22, 2015: Arrested, charged with 5 counts of fraud and conspiracy |
| February 19, 2015: Indicted by grand jury |
| February 24, 2015: Two counts of conspiracy dropped, pleads not guilty to bribery, extortion |
| April 10, 2015: Judge rejects request to drop corruption charges |
| April 23, 2015: New charge filed against Silver |
| November 2, 2015: Trial began |
| November 30, 2015: Silver convicted |
| May 3, 2016: Silver sentenced to 12 years in prison |
| July 13, 2017: Silver's conviction overturned |
On January 22, 2015, Silver was arrested and charged with five counts of fraud and conspiracy. The court documents alleged that Silver used his position to take more than $4 million in bribes and kickbacks from the two law firms, Weitz & Luxenberg and Goldberg & Iryami, which he allegedly masked as legitimate income. According to court documents, Silver was paid $1.4 million in salary from the law firm of Weitz & Luxenberg based on his position in the assembly and not for work that he performed. He also received $3.9 million in attorney referral fees. Prosecutors in the case say that Silver steered $500,000 in state funds to an unnamed doctor and the doctor in turn steered asbestos cases to the firm. The law firm of Goldberg & Iryami was not named in the criminal complaint, but a source close to the investigation named the firm as the unnamed "Real Estate Law Firm" referenced in the court documents.[7] According to Robert W. Ryan, a criminal investigator in the office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, Silver steered two developers to Goldberg & Iryami and received a share of the fees the firm collected from the developers.[7][7][10]
Resignation as speaker
On January 25, 2015, Silver announced that he would temporarily relinquish his duties as speaker of the New York State Assembly. He planned to delegate his responsibilities to a group of five senior Democratic leaders: Assembly Majority Leader Joseph Morelle, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Herman Farrell, Carl Heastie, Joseph Lentol, and Catherine Nolan.[11] However, this plan was not accepted by Assembly Democrats, who announced on January 27 that Silver had until February 2 to resign, or he would be removed through a resolution.[12]
On January 30, 2015, Silver submitted a resignation letter, effective February 2, for his position as speaker. Joseph Morelle (D) served as interim speaker until Carl Heastie (D) was elected to the position on February 3.[13][14][15]
Indictment
On February 19, 2015, Silver was indicted by a grand jury on one count of honest services mail fraud, one count of honest services wire fraud and one count of using his office for extortion. Since Silver's initial arrest, the two counts of conspiracy had been dropped.[1] He was arraigned on February 24, 2015, and pleaded not guilty.[16]
On April 10, 2015, a judge rejected Silver's attempt to have his corruption charges dropped. Silver and his lawyers believed that the charges should have been dropped because of public statements made by U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara that they said unfairly influenced a grand jury that later indicted him. At the press conference when Silver was first charged, Bharara said that Silver, "corruptly profited from [the] tremendous personal fortune he amassed through the abuse of his political power."[16] The judge ruled that while Bharara's comments about Silver went too far, it was not enough to have the indictment thrown out.[17][18]
Additional charge
On April 23, 2015, federal prosecutors filed a new criminal charge against Silver. Silver was charged with engaging in monetary transactions involving crime proceeds.[2] The new charge accuses Silver of transferring some of the $4 million that he received in real-estate kickbacks and asbestos-patient referral fees into high-yield investments opportunities that were not available to the general public.[19] In total, Silver now faces two counts each of mail fraud, wire fraud, extortion and the new charge of engaging in monetary transactions involving crime proceeds. Silver pleaded not guilty to the new charges.[2]
Silver reportedly ruled out a plea deal, saying, "I'm glad there is a trial date. ... I'm confident that at the end of this process I will be totally vindicated."[20]
Conviction and sentencing
On November 30, 2015, Silver was found guilty on all seven counts of honest services fraud, extortion and money laundering. The conviction removed Silver from the state Assembly.[3] [21][22][23]
On May 3, 2016, Silver was sentenced to 12 years in prison. He was also fined $1.75 million and ordered to forfeit $5.3 million.[4]
Conviction overturned
On July 13, 2017, Silver's 2015 conviction was overturned by the United States Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. The three-judge panel cited a 2016 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that overturned the conviction of former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R). The 2016 ruling narrowed the definition of what it takes to convict public officials of wrongdoing. The appeals court determined that the judge's instructions in Silver's 2015 trial were not consistent with the 2016 Supreme Court decision.[5]
Recent news
This section links to a Google news search for the term "Sheldon + Silver + trial"
See also
External links
- Profile from Open States
- Legislative profile from Project Vote Smart
- Biography from Project Vote Smart
- Campaign contributions via OpenSecrets
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Yahoo News, "New York assembly ex-speaker Silver indicted on corruption charges," accessed February 19, 2015
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedwsj2 - ↑ 3.0 3.1 NY Times, "Sheldon Silver, Ex-New York Assembly Speaker, Is Found Guilty on All Counts," accessed November 30, 2015
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 auburnpub.com, " BREAKING: Ex-NY Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver gets 12 years in prison," accessed May 3, 2016
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 NY Times, "Sheldon Silver’s 2015 Corruption Conviction Is Overturned," accessed July 13, 2017
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Gothamist, "Feds Reportedly Investigating Powerful Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver," December 30, 2014
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 NY Times, "U.S. Said to Investigate Sheldon Silver, New York Assembly Speaker, Over Payments," December 29, 2014 Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; name "nytimes" defined multiple times with different content - ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Wall Street Journal, "Feds Probe N.Y. State Assembly Speaker Silver Over Income," December 30, 2014
- ↑ CBS New York, "U.S. Attorney Blasts Gov. Cuomo’s Decision To Shut Down Anti-Corruption Commission," April 10, 2014
- ↑ Reuters, "N.Y. state assembly speaker charged with fraud in corruption probe," January 22, 2015
- ↑ New York Times, "Sheldon Silver to Temporarily Relinquish Speaker Duties," accessed January 27, 2015
- ↑ Bloomberg Business, "Silver Gets Feb. 2 Ultimatum to Resign as N.Y. Assembly Speaker," archived January 28, 2015
- ↑ The Wall Street Journal, "Sheldon Silver Submits Resignation Letter," January 30, 2015
- ↑ New York Times, "Sheldon Silver to Be Replaced as Speaker of New York State Assembly," January 27, 2015
- ↑ ABC News, "Democrat Carl Heastie Elected Speaker of New York Assembly," archived February 4, 2015
- ↑ 16.0 16.1 Slate, "Mouthing off," March 2, 2015
- ↑ whec.com, "Judge rejects former Assembly speaker's attempt to drop corruption charges," accessed April 23, 2015
- ↑ Reuters, "Ex-NY Assembly speaker loses bid to dismiss corruption charges," accessed April 23, 2015
- ↑ timesunion.com/, "Ex-Speaker Sheldon Silver faces new charge in indictment rewrite," accessed April 24, 2015
- ↑ New York Daily News, "Ex-New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver's corruption trial set for November," April 29, 2015
- ↑ Newsday, "Former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver convicted on all counts in corruption trial," accessed November 30, 2015
- ↑ twcnews.com, "Following Corruption Conviction, Former Assembly Speaker Silver Disbarred," accessed March 29, 2016
- ↑ syracuse.com, "Prosecutors seek long jail terms for ex-NY Senate leader, son," accessed April 6, 2016
