The current bribery scandal now rocking New York City is remarkable - not only for the youth of its perpetrator (38), but also how remarkably careless (or stupid) he was. His story might help guide the many corrupt politicians this side of the world.
Eric Ulrich, the good looking and recently-appointed Building Commissioner of New York, was in a very powerful position - and he knew it. To that end, he is alleged to have exploited his position by the usual shenanigans we are so used to seeing in this country: trading favors, placing relatives of friends in government posts, and making sure the wheels of government permit processing were slicker than usual.
The details can be gleaned from the many newspaper accounts now flooding the web - but what struck me was his acquisition of a painting by a Salvador Dali protege, Francisco Poblet.
According to the prosecutors, Poblet was the creator of Don Quixote de La Mancha (reported in other papers as Don Quixote de la Maneda), a portrait of, who else. The Building Commissioner is alleged to have had his eye on the painting as a gift for his girlfriend (lucky gal), and so he schemed to get his hands on it.
How did he do it? Well, in coded language that was disappointingly (for him) easy to decode. Ulrich exchanged a series of text messages to his procurer, Paul Grego, about the painting. Grego messages “I got the things for you, the painting.” In an attempt to deflect the provenance of the painting, Grego very helpfully adds “that your daughter did.”
Ulrich took the cue and texted back “She did, I remember that, yeah…I forgot I left it in the room.” Of course, if Ulrich’s daughter painted the work, it would have been perfectly kosher for Ulrich to retrieve it. Grego helpfully informed Ulrich that “I have it in my house.” To add an element of casualness about the whole shady deal, Ulrich responded “Alright, no problem. I’ll get it. I’ll get it whenever, no worries. I’ll see you.”
The only problem to this entire fabricated story was that Grego had sent a picture of the Poblet painting to precede their conversation. And so naturally, the entire discourse that followed would have be in regard to that painting, and not something else that Ulrich’ daughter might have painted through her own efforts. (Does she even paint?)
For Ulrich to have played along and pretended that his daughter was the painter was pretty dumb. Did he not realize that his text messages could be subpoenaed and reviewed by prosecutors? Is he not reading the saga of all these Congressmen and other politicians whose phone records are being subpoenaed by investigating bodies? Even entire phones are being seized, and their contents scrutinized by law enforcement bodies.
Has Ulrich not heard about Trump’s private messages on his Twitter account being turned over to the Justice Department, this despite X, aka Twitter, fighting against the court order? As part of the investigation against Trump’s attempts to steal the election from Biden, the Justice Department has been running after Trump’s private convos. And X has been siding with Trump in an attempt to keep the messages private. But it’s a no-go, as the courts have allowed the Justice Department access to those.
Even here in the Philippines, Facebook posts by are being reviewed and acted upon by the Supreme Court in its disciplinary proceedings against lawyers. Even if the lawyer argues that his post was made in a private group, with settings set on “private,” the Supreme Court took the position that it could use those private posts to sanction the lawyer.
The best tactic Ulrich could have employed at the point was probably to text back and say “Huh? Wtf are you talking about?.” This would be followed by a quick phone call berating the other guy for trying to entrap him. (Because if he tried just verbalizing what he was thinking instead of writing it down, he would have run the risk of the phone call being recorded.).
That potential snafu out of the way, the conspirators could have found some other way to make the delivery. Perhaps, much like the Philippines, he could have found a patsy to play bagman. Lesson learned for politicians and other government servants. Maybe use a burner phone? I don’t know. With the quality and sophistication of listening and recording technology, nothing much seems to escape the eye. And ear.
Perhaps, just do your job and not be corrupt?