Officials of developer Bruce Ratner’s firm are claiming the company had no clue it recruited a convicted drug dealer and election fraudster to salvage a stalled $842 million mixed-use development in Yonkers.
Forest City Ratner officials told The Post that they never conducted a background check in 2006 on then-Yonkers Republican Party Chairman Zehy Jereis before awarding him what amounted to a $5,000-a-month no-show job. This was after they learned of the political crony’s criminal record from a reporter.
Jereis – who has no real estate experience – got the “consulting” gig three months after convincing then-Councilwoman Sandy Annabi in July 2006 to change her vote and push through FCR’s “Ridge Hill” project.
FCR – whose Big Apple projects include Brooklyn’s controversial Atlantic Yards development – hasn’t been charged with any wrongdoing but is featured in the fed’s ongoing corruption case against Jereis and Annabi that is playing out in Manhattan federal court.
Shortly after testifying in Manhattan federal court Monday, Scott Cantone, FCR’s senior VP for government affairs, told the Post the company was unaware of Jereis’ shady past and never did a background check on him.
FCR spokesman Joe DePlasco said the firm had “no way of knowing” Jereis had a criminal record because “he was the leader of the Yonkers Republican Party.”
Jereis in 1994 was arrested by undercover Westchester cops and charged with helping facilitate the sale of more than 20 pounds of marijuana, records show. He was allowed to plead guilty to a misdemeanor.
Jereis also pleaded guilty to a Westchester election-fraud charge in 1998.
While Jereis’ criminal past hasn’t come up in the trial, Cantone’s ex-boss, Bruce Bender, testified that FCR would never had hired Jereis if it was aware that Jereis’ relationship with Annabi previously included lavishing her with ten of thousands of dollars in gifts, including student-loan and car payments.
Both Bender and Cantone insisted Jereis’ hiring wasn’t a “quid pro quo.”
“We were caught between a rock and hard place,” Bender said.
Jereis was fired after three months, during which he was paid $15,000, once the firm learned Jereis was the focus of a federal corruption probe.
He collected his salary despite failing to document work on invoices submitted to the company until March 2007, when the feds began dropping subpoenas as part of the investigation.
Jereis and Annabi are both fighting bribery and corruption charges.