A retired FDNY chief accused of fast-tracking safety inspections for thousands of dollars in off-the-books kickbacks pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiracy to commit bribery.
Chief Brian Cordasco, 49, will also have to cough up $57,000 in ill-gotten gains from the bribery scam, which prosecutors said earned him and Chief Anthony Saccavino more than $190,000 in illegal payoffs.
The two retired chiefs were charged with bribery, wire fraud, lying to the FBI, and related charges on Sept. 16.
“Brian Cordasco abused the public’s trust repeatedly by selling access to the Bureau of Fire Prevention’s services in a pay-to-play bribery scheme,” Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York said in a statement. “Today’s guilty plea should send a message that SDNY is committed to holding our public officials accountable when they resort to corruption.”
The two chiefs — who oversaw safety inspections for large city buildings and projects as the head of the FDNY’s Bureau of Fire Prevention — exploited a backlog of inspections during the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic and agreed to bump paying developers to the top of the line.
The pivotal FDNY bureau is responsible for overseeing and approving the installation of fire safety and suppression systems in commercial and residential buildings throughout the city and making sure they are in compliance with fire safety regulations.
A failed or delayed inspection by the BFP could prevent a building from being opened to the public, officials said.
The two ran the scam with retired Firefighter Henry Santiago from 2021 through last year, officials said. The kickbacks added to Saccavino’s $263,478 salary in 2023 and Cordasco’s $257,296 yearly take-home pay, prosecutors said.
As they carried out their scam, Cordasco lied to other BFP members to justify otherwise improper expediting requests, federal prosecutors said. He also lied to law enforcement when interviewed about his involvement in the scheme.
Concerns of the bribe taking were first made by FDNY administrators to the city’s Department of Investigation, which began a probe that soon included the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s office.
“This former chief of the Bureau of Fire Prevention chose to ignore his responsibility to the city and its taxpayers when he took thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for expediting certain fire reviews and inspections,” DOI Commissioner Jocelyn Strauber added.
The two chiefs were placed on modified assignment and were not allowed to take part in any inspections in February, around the same time the FBI raided their homes for evidence. The two had retired from the FDNY when criminal charges were filed against them in September.
Cordasco pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to solicit and receive a bribe, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison, officials said. He’ll be sentenced on Feb. 19.
Saccavino maintains his innocence and has not indicated that he plans to plead out.
The case was brought in the leadup to the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s case against Mayor Adams, which partly alleges he accepted bribes from the Turkish government to circumvent fire safety checks at Turkey’s consulate in Manhattan.
The feds have not drawn a line between the two cases.
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