NYC correction union leader Norman Seabrook’s bribery trial starts

New York City jail-union boss Norman Seabrook didn’t hesitate when fixer Jona Rechnitz told him during a Dominican Republic junket that he might be able to get kickbacks for placing union pension money with a hedge fund, a prosecutor said as Seabrook’s bribery trial began Tuesday.

“Seabrook was immediately interested,” prosecutor Martin Bell told a Manhattan federal court jury in his opening argument. “He turned to Rechnitz and said, ‘It’s time that Norman Seabrook got paid.’ ”

Seabrook, 57, who headed the Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association for 20 years, is accused of investing $20 million with co-defendant Murray Huberfeld’s Platinum Partners in return for a $60,000 bribe that was allegedly delivered by Rechnitz in a Ferragamo bag in December, 2014.

Defense lawyers told jurors to focus on the credibility of bagman Rechnitz — a Brooklyn real estate investor linked to two Ponzi schemes who became the government’s star witness in probes of corruption at both City Hall and the NYPD. He is expected to testify in the Seabrook trial on Wednesday.

They described Rechnitz as a rich kid from Los Angeles who spread money and campaign donations around New York to insinuate himself into circles of power — he had numbers for Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD Chief Philip Banks on his cellphone and a New York Post Page Six reporter on “speed dial” — and made up stories when he got in trouble.

Paul Shechtman, Seabrook’s lawyer, promised a full-fledged assault on Rechnitz’s credibility, telling jurors Rechnitz had claimed to own buildings he managed and yachts he rented, lied to get a gun license by claiming to be a “diamond dealer” and falsely claimed that he was a police chaplain in Westchester County to keep the license confidential.

“Jona Rechnitz is a liar, a serial liar, a pathological liar,” Shechtman said. “He lies about the smallest things and the most important things. And he is lying about this case.”

Henry Mazurek, Huberfeld’s lawyer, said his client hired Rechnitz to find investors because of his growing reputation as a man with connections — “Cupid for business people” — and paid him a commission, but Rechnitz made up the claim that he paid a bribe to Seabrook.

“He was facing many years in prison,” Mazurek said. “He worked out a deal.”

Bell admitted Rechnitz was a “wannabe big shot” who bought favors from pols and cops and engaged in “shady” deals, but said his story had corroboration — the $800 Ferragamo bag he said he used to deliver the bribe was later found at Seabrook’s home when he was arrested last year.

Shechtman, however, argued that even the corroboration was phony, telling jurors that the bag from Ferragamo — Seabrook’s favorite store — was the kind of gift Rechnitz gave to impress people, but it was empty.

“They will spend days proving everything but what matters: Was there $60,000 in the bag?” he said. “For that you will have only the word of Jona Rechnitz.”

The trial resumes on Wednesday.