Oyster Bay legal bills related to Singh cases top $3.3M
Oyster Bay’s legal bills over disputed loan guarantees with former concessionaire Harendra Singh have topped $3.3 million and continue to climb.
The total represents payments authorized by the town to three outside law firms since 2015.
On Tuesday the Town Board approved paying $676,716 for a nearly year-old bill from the Manhattan law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP for work on the issue. Since 2015, the town has paid or approved more than $1 million in payments to the firm for Singh-related work from February 2015 through October 2016.
The disputed loan guarantees are at the heart of federal charges brought against Singh, former Town Supervisor John Venditto and Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano. Federal prosecutors allege that Mangano pressured Venditto to execute guarantees on Singh’s behalf in return for bribes and kickbacks. The three have pleaded not guilty. Mangano and Venditto’s trial is scheduled to begin in January. The multimillion dollar loans were supposed to pay for capital improvements to town-owned facilities that prosecutors alleged weren’t done.
Read more: https://www.newsday.com/long-island/nassau/oyster-bay-legal-fees-singh-1.14991866