Convicted Oyster Bay concessionaire Harendra Singh still fighting foreclosure on his Syosset mansion

                                                                             
                                                                                  

House owned by Harendra Singh and wife, from a Nassau County Dept. of Assessment 2008 photo

While Former Nassau County Executive Ed Mangano and his wife await sentencing for taking bribes from Oyster Bay concessionaire Harendra Singh -- and as the federal judge hearing their case appears ready to throw the book at them -- Singh is still fighting foreclosure on his Syosset mansion, even blaming Covid as the reason why he hasn't paid his mortgage since 2014.

Five years ago, a court referee then calculated Singh owed nearly $3 million in principle, interest and penalties to lender Cit Bank, which issued the mortgage on Singh's 2-acre estate. Nassau County says the house, built in 2008, is currently worth $2.138 million (lowered from $2.62 million last year after a successful assessment challenge.)

A state appellate court in 2021 upheld a foreclosure ordered in Jan. 2018 by Supreme Court Justice Tom Adams, then Nassau's chief administrative judge and now Nassau County attorney.

But Astoria attorney Patrick Binakis, representing Singh,  last month filed a motion to re-argue the case, alleging technical deficiencies in the bank's filing for foreclosure and the subsequent referee's report, court records show.

Days before the appellate court ruled against him, Singh filed  a covid-related hardship claim, using an order issued by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo to stop banks from foreclosing on deadbeat mortgage holders during the coronavirus pandemic.

"I am experiencing financial hardship and am unable to pay my mortgage in full....because of significant loss of household income during the Covid-19 pandemic...." Singh attested, records show. He did not mention his criminal conviction in the six reasons listed for seeking relief. (see hardship claim below)

Singh pleaded guilty in 2016 to eight felony counts for bribing Mangano and Oyster Bay Town officials in exchange for the town backing more than $20 million in private loans to Singh intended to pay for improvements at two town concessions. He has yet to be sentenced and apparently is still living in his five-bedroom, four-bath house.

Singh served as a main prosecution witness against the Mangano's at two federal trials. The first ended in a hung jury. The second jury in 2019 convicted them for participating in the loan guarantee scheme.

The Manganos have appealed, contending they are innocent and that Singh lied.

U.S. District court Judge Joan Azrack last month denied the Mangano request for a new trial and set a March 24 sentencing date.

The lawyer for Mangano's wife Linda on Friday submitted a sentencing memo, saying the mother of two sons should get community service, rather than jail time. Lawyer John Carman wrote community service for Linda Mangano "is justified by a life defined by kindness and a selfless impulse to help others less fortunate."

A key prosecution point was that Singh had given Linda Mangano a $100,000-a-year no-show job at one of his restaurants in April 2010 just before a meeting where Mangano and town officials discussed ways to secure financing for Singh.

Prosecutors contend that the job -- and other gifts to Mangano -- were bribes in exchange for Mangano pressuring Oyster Bay officials to approve loan guarantees for Singh despite a state constitution ban against municipalities providing credit to private vendors.

Carman acknowledged it was a "low-show" job but wrote that Linda Mangano had considered Singh to be a close friend for 25 years and had no idea he was "a serial criminal...the type of person who would break any law that stood in the way of what he wanted."

A sentencing memo from Ed Mangano's attorney is expected to be filed tomorrow.

Azrack presided over both Mangano trials and recently sentenced Mangano's former chief Deputy Rob Walker to 18 months in prison for obstructing justice by trying to cover up a $5,000 payment from a county contractor.

That's when Azrack signaled her disdain for the former Republican Mangano administration.

She called Walker's conduct "business as usual" in the "corrupt culture" of Nassau County government and politics

That disapproval was obvious from reading her Jan. 6 162-page decision (162 pages!) denying Mangano's motion for a new trial.

She wrote that Mangano's reporting of his wife's job with Singh on his annual county financial disclosures was proof that he took bribes. She describe the disclosures as a "ruse" to "lull Nassau County and the citizens of Nassau County (including those citizens living in the TOB) from discovering Mangano's bribery scheme."

Is there any doubt that if Mangano had not disclosed his wife's employment with Singh that too would be seen as proof of his taking bribes from the concessionaire?

Azrack shrugs off decisions from three other courts that found the loan guarantees (separate from an initial $1.5 million deal that Mangano's former law firm helped structure) were illegal and unenforceable because they were not approved by the town board.

Though Azrack writes that Mangano didn't know about those subsequent guarantees arranged by Singh, she concludes that Mangano should have foreseen them as part of the conspiracy scheme.

And, she contends, Mangano also should have foreseen that then-Town Attorney and Deputy Supervisor Len Genova would sign the illegal deals without reading them because Mangano knew Singh "might also bribe other officials who might influence or pervert the process in some respect."

Genova, who admitted taking bribes from Singh, was granted immunity in return for his testimony for the prosecution.

Azrack further found that Singh, who acknowledged during the trial that he forged the late Oyster Bay Supervisor John Venditto's signature on at least one loan document, gave testimony that was "credible and supported by independent evidence."

Here is Singh's declaration of a Covid-related hardship: