Here Are the Charges Eric Adams Faces, Annotated

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This is a historic and remarkable case title, naming Eric Adams as the first mayor in modern New York City history to be criminally charged while in office, only three years after he was elected to lead City Hall.

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The scope of the accusations are stunning. Prosecutors say that for almost a decade, Adams abused his power as Brooklyn borough president and later as mayor in order to receive illegal campaign donations and luxury travel benefits — including free flight upgrades, hotel stays and high-end meals.

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Often, a criminal indictment is written like a story. Here, federal prosecutors describe the main character, in this case Adams, and start to set a scene before describing the specifics of a criminal conspiracy of which he was a member.

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Federal prosecutors accuse Adams and his campaign of illegally taking advantage of New York City’s generous public matching program by using so-called straw donors — people who make campaign donations with someone else’s money — to inflate the amount to which he was entitled. However, the number they use here — $10,000,000 — is the total amount of matching funds he received, rather than what he might have obtained illegally.

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The indictment accuses Adams of concealing at least $123,000 worth of flight upgrades and tickets that were gifts from a Turkish official and other Turkish nationals. He did not report any of these gifts on his annual disclosure forms.

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Adams’s love of travel is well known, and he has often spoken of all the international destinations he has visited — going back to his time as a state senator. Reporters have often questioned how these trips were paid for, and now prosecutors are saying some of them, along with free meals and hotel rooms, were given to him as bribes.

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For prosecutors, an important part of proving a defendant’s guilt is providing evidence that he knew what he was doing was wrong. That is why they have included this section accusing Adams of trying to cover up his crimes with phony paper trails, token payments and deleted messages.

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This answers a big question raised by the investigation: How did Turkish officials and other Turkish nationals benefit from having a close relationship with the New York City mayor? This is one of many examples cited throughout the indictment.

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This introduction explains how the city’s public matching program for campaigns works. The indictment then describes how Adams is accused of abusing it.

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Adams went to Turkey twice in four months during his first year as Brooklyn borough president. The second trip was arranged by a Turkish entrepreneur, with ties to celebrities, according to the indictment. The New York Times has identified the person who arranged the trip as Arda Sayiner.

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“The Turkish official,” described throughout the indictment as a main player in this conspiracy, is Reyhan Özgür, who until recently was the Turkish consul general in New York. Before August 2020, he was the deputy consul general. In those roles, Özgür interacted with Adams in his capacities both as Brooklyn borough president and as mayor.

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This appears to be a reference to Enver Yücel, a wealthy Turkish businessman who founded Bahcesehir University in Istanbul and Bay Atlantic University in Washington, D.C. While he was borough president, Adams weighed in to support a charter school that Yücel tried to open in New York without success.

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This matches the description of Rana Abbasova, who served as the mayor’s longtime liaison to the Turkish community. Her home was searched by federal agents, and she later cooperated with the Adams investigation.

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Adams has talked publicly about his love of Turkish Airlines, calling the airline “my way of flying” in a 2017 interview. He praised the airline for accommodating his vegan dietary needs.

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Winnie Greco, whose name does not appear in the indictment, was Adams’s Asian affairs liaison. She is now a special adviser to the mayor and his director of Asian affairs. Greco’s home was raided by the F.B.I. in February in a case that is being investigated by a different jurisdiction, the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn.

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The indictment describes how Adams went out of his way to use Turkish Airlines so he could travel for free.

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This appears to describe Demet Sabancı Çetindoğan, a businesswoman from a wealthy family and owner of the St. Regis hotel in Istanbul. Records from the Brooklyn borough president’s office show that before this 2017 trip, Adams had dinner with her at a restaurant called Spago during a trip to Turkey in December 2015.

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The Turkish Airlines manager in New York was Cenk Öcal, whose home was searched by the F.B.I. late last year. Adams named Öcal to his 2021 mayoral transition committee.

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Adams’s 2021 mayoral campaign didn’t disclose this June 22, 2018, fund-raising event to the city’s Campaign Finance Board. But that day, the campaign reported gathering $21,100 from 20 donors without connecting them to that event.

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This paragraph seems particularly problematic for Adams. It shows that prosecutors have text messages in which a promoter who arranged Adams’s trips (Sayiner) discussed illegally funneling foreign contributions to Adams in a conversation with his aide (Abbasova). Abbasova, who is now cooperating with prosecutors, has apparently told them that Adams approved this illegal scheme and that she would testify to that. His lawyers would certainly challenge her testimony if the case ever goes to trial.

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The assertions about Adams’s failure to report some of his free foreign travel on his annual disclosure forms raise questions about the efficacy of the Conflicts of Interest Board.

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It is remarkable, if true as prosecutors say, that Adams was discouraged by Özgür, the deputy Turkish consul general, from meeting with a Turkish businessman who was in legal trouble about possible donations, and Adams did it anyway.

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This echoes the mindset that we have seen with other foreign nationals who have tried to curry favor with American municipal officials. Their hope is to gain leverage over these lower-level officials who may eventually rise in national politics.

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Based on campaign records, this description matches Tolib Mansurov, an Uzbek businessman who runs a company called United Elite Group. The records show that Mansurov and four other company employees donated $2,000 to Adams’s campaign on Dec. 17, 2020.

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After arranging straw contributions, Mansurov sought help from Adams, including with problems he was having with the Department of Buildings, according to the indictment. Later, prosecutors say, Mansurov thanked Adams, who had promised to look into his issues, after they were partially resolved.

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A fund-raiser organized by Erden Arkan, the owner of KSK Construction, was held on May 7, 2021. The event brought in $69,720 for Adams’s mayoral campaign from 84 donors. The campaign then used those donations to seek an additional $63,760 in public matching funds, according to campaign documents obtained by The Times.

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Campaign finance records show that the Adams campaign received five $2,000 donations on Sept. 27, 2021, from people listed as employees of Bay Atlantic University, the small Turkish-owned institution based in Washington, D.C. Those gifts came from a fund-raiser held on Sept. 18, 2021, and were refunded the following month, according to information submitted to the Campaign Finance Board.

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The Adams campaign raised over $8.9 million for his 2021 mayoral election, and received over $10 million in public funds, more than any other citywide candidate received that year. In August, the Campaign Finance Board, in a 900-page preliminary audit of Adams’s 2021 mayoral campaign, chronicled numerous missing payments, sham donations and the potential misallocation of up to $2.3 million in taxpayer money.

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When Adams sought last-minute tickets to Istanbul in 2021, his aide called the Turkish Airlines manager, who said they would be very expensive — then discounted them to $50, the indictment says.

The aide, however, rejected such a cheap price — “No, dear. $50? ” she said — to avoid suspicion, according to the indictment, and Adams ended up paying $2,200 for business-class tickets that would have cost $15,000 on the open market.

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The Turkish government also paid for Adams’s chief fundraiser at the time, Brianna Suggs, to travel to Istanbul, and then gave her a fake bill for her hotel stay, the indictment says.

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The Turkish House was erected at the cost of nearly $300 million, a sum that drew criticism in Turkey in 2021, when students protested the high cost of housing.

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Here begins the narrative of how prosecutors say Adams influenced the Fire Department to allow the Turkish Consulate to open in time for a visit by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan despite safety concerns. In exchange, prosecutors say, Adams received travel perks and other gifts.

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At this point, Adams had won the Democratic primary for mayor and was likely to be the next occupant of City Hall, so his outreach to the fire commissioner carried weight.

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In this email message included in the indictment, a Fire Department official made clear the Turkish consulate project had too many safety issues to approve. But after Adams exerted pressure, officials later signed off on it anyway, the indictment says.

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Adams reported back to the Turkish consul general, Reyhan Ozgur,, that the building would be approved. Ozgur wrote back: “You are a true friend of Turkey.” Adams replied: “Yes even more a true friend of yours. You are my brother. I am hear (sic) to help.”

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After he was elected mayor, Adams and his partner took a highly publicized trip to Ghana. At the time, Adams’s campaign spokesman told reporters that Adams had paid for the trip himself. But, according to the indictment, Adams purchased two tickets to Pakistan on Turkish Airlines for a total of $1,436, then had the airline manager upgrade the tickets to business class and change the destination to Ghana — tickets that would have cost $14,000 — meaning that Adams is accused of receiving $12,000 in airline tickets for free.

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Before he went to Ghana, the indictment says, Adams had a nine-hour layover in Istanbul during which he was treated by the Turkish government to a luxury car, a driver and a high-end dinner. An important side note here: The Turkish consul general, Ozgur, messaged Adams’s aide to make sure Adams understood where the gifts were coming from. “We are the state,” prosecutors quote Ozgur as saying.

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Adams named Cenk Ocal, the Turkish Airlines manager who arranged for his free and discounted travel, to his mayoral transition committee.

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A catalog of travel benefits Adams is accused of receiving begins here.

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In the month Adams took office, he met in a private restaurant space with Arda Sayiner, the entrepreneur who had earlier offered to secure illegal contributions, the indictment says, adding that when Sayiner offered more help, Adams accepted.

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The indictment now moves into the heart of Adams’s first term as mayor, accusing him of continuing to do favors for his Turkish benefactors and continuing to solicit illegal funds, now for his re-election campaign.

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In September 2023, Abbasova, Sayiner and Suggs arranged a fundraiser for foreign donors — and disguised it as a meeting to discuss sustainability issues with a PowerPoint presentation and a cost of $5,000 to attend, according to the indictment.

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On Oct. 9th 2023, the Adams campaign raised $16,700 from the Turkish-American community, according to campaign records. The indictment mentions one of the organizers as as a publisher of a magazine aimed at Turkish Americans, which appears to describe Cemil Ozyurt, owner of the Turk of America magazine. Ozyurt donated $1,000 that day to the campaign, records show.

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“Are they going to make the limit?”

There are repeated references in the indictment to Adams’s refusal to show up at fundraisers unless his campaign received at least $25,000.

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When the investigation that led to this indictment became public in November 2023, prosecutors said, Adams scheduled yet another dinner with a businessman who was going to illegally contribute to his campaign through straw donors. But when news of the inquiry emerged, that dinner was canceled, the indictment said.

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According to the indictment, Adams’s chief fundraiser, Brianna Suggs, called Adams five times before allowing F.B.I. agents who showed up at her door in Brooklyn last year to enter. She then refused to say who had paid for her trip to Turkey, prosecutors say.

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Prosecutors say that Adams’s aide, Rana Abbasova, tried to delete incriminating messages in a bathroom when the F.B.I. showed up at her house, which later led to her suspension from City Hall.

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This is just a jaw-dropping section of the indictment.

(There appears to be a typo when prosecutors refer to Adams’s claims that he changed his password on Nov. 5, 2024. F.B.I. agents took his phone in 2023, and presumably said he had changed his password then. )

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The formal counts against Adams are described here, along with the “overt acts” — specific incidents — that prosecutors say support the charges. These are typically laid out near the end of an indictment.

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If Mr. Adams is convicted of all five counts in the indictment, the maximum penalty under law would be 45 years in prison. But under the federal sentencing guidelines, he would most likely receive a much shorter prison term.

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The indictment is signed by the foreperson of the grand jury that voted to approve it, whose name is redacted, and by U.S. Attorney Damian Williams, whose name is not.