Former NYPD inspector Dwayne Montgomery pled guilty Monday to conspiracy charges for his role in orchestrating a straw donor scheme to benefit Eric Adams’ 2021 mayoral campaign.
Montgomery — whom the mayor knew socially from their service as police officers — copped to fifth-degree conspiracy charges, a Class A misdemeanor, in front of Judge Althea Drysdale at Manhattan Criminal Court early Monday morning. In the plea agreement, Montgomery agreed to pay a $500 fine and submit to 200 hours of community service, which he will complete as an instructor at BKLYN Combine, a non-profit serving African-American youth from financially disadvantaged communities.
Montgomery was one of six co-defendants indicted last summer by a grand jury, which Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg convened, as part of the sprawling scheme to fill Adams’ campaign coffers with illegal straw donations, wherein people who make contributions are reimbursed to shield the true origin of the funds and get around campaign finance limits.
Mayor Adams has not been accused of wrongdoing and has denied any involvement in the scheme, despite knowing Montgomery personally. At a Monday press conference, Adams reiterated that there was “nothing our campaign did that was a part of what was done wrong.” He noted that thousands of his donors had not done anything wrong, and that donors were made to affirm in writing or online that they were donating their own money and not someone else’s.
A campaign compliance attorney also reviewed donations, and thousands were returned for not meeting legal muster, he said.
“The campaign did its job, we did the review we were supposed to review,” Adams said. “And I have always told you from the beginning, I’m confident that we did the internal scrutiny we’re supposed to do.”
In his guilty plea, Montgomery admitted to conspiring with others to make illegal contributions to Adams’ mayoral campaign by using straw donors, thus enabling the campaign to receive additional funds through the city’s Campaign Finance Board (CFB).
Using the city’s public matching campaign funds system, a straw donor could illicitly yield 8-to-1 matching funds to a preferred candidate multiple times and get a big return on their dirty dollars. The public match only applies to donations under $250.
Montgomery admitted that he “directed straw donors to make contributions” to Adams and reimbursed the donors. He also admitted that he “directed and aided others to structure campaign contributions by utilizing straw donors, with the intention of triggering matching funds.”
“The completed campaign contribution forms were made to appear that the contributions were made by the straw donors using their own funds when, in fact, the source of the funds was the Defendant and others,” reads Montgomery’s guilty plea.
Montgomery admitted that on Aug. 14, 2020, he sent “Straw Donor-6” $260 on Cash App, and immediately after that Straw Donor-6 donated $260 to Adams’ campaign. In the original indictment, Montgomery was alleged to have withdrawn nearly $40,000 from his bank account just days earlier, and to have similarly reimbursed several other donors.
Two fellow co-defendants, brothers Shahid and Yahya Mushtaq, pleaded guilty in October and are cooperating in Bragg’s investigation.
There is no indication that Montgomery is cooperating with investigators in the case. His lawyer, Anthony Ricco, did not immediately return a request for comment. Manhattan DA spokespeople did not immediately comment on whether Montgomery is cooperating.
The straw donor case is just one plank of the legal peril faced by Adams ahead of his reelection campaign, although the mayor himself has not been accused of any wrongdoing.
In November, top campaign fundraiser Brianna Suggs’ home in Brooklyn was raided by the FBI, allegedly in connection to an investigation of whether the Turkish government had concealed illegal foreign contributions to Adams using straw donors. A week later, FBI agents stopped Adams himself on the street and seized his phones.
Meanwhile, Adams’ former Buildings Commissioner Eric Ulrich was indicted in September for allegedly taking tens of thousands of dollars in bribes during his time in the City Council and at the Department of Buildings. He has pled not guilty. Ulrich’s next court date is in May.
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