NYC housing official pleads guilty to scheme

The New York City housing official accused last year in a bribery and kickback scheme along with two prominent Long Island real estate lawyers has pleaded guilty to taking $2.5 million in illegal payoffs on affordable housing projects he supervised during a 13-year period.

Wendell Walters, 49, a former assistant commissioner in the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development, faces up to 30 years in prison after admitting Friday to charges of racketeering, conspiracy and bribery in federal court in Brooklyn.

"In exchange for cash payments I helped certain sponsors get on the approval list," Walters told U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon. "I also gave my vote of confidence to be selected on projects over which I had supervisory responsibility."

Walters was charged last October with taking bribes from developers and contractors seeking work on government-subsidized affordable housing projects in a 26-count indictment that also named lawyers Lee Hymowitz, 60, of Oceanside, and Michael Freeman, 64, of Manhasset, among six co-defendants.

The plea did not include the seven counts of conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering in which law partners Hymowitz and Freeman are charged. Walters' attorney would not say whether he is cooperating with the government as part of his plea deal.

Prosecutors in October charged that Hymowitz, Freeman and real estate developer Stevenson Dunn got contracts through bribes and then demanded kickbacks from contractors. Freeman was chairman of the Nassau Community College board of trustees when he was charged, and quickly resigned.