Oliver Pan
John Liu
NAILED: Jenny Hou forces a smile (above) yesterday at Manhattan court, where she and Oliver Pan (inset left) were convicted of fraud in fund-raising for John Liu (inset right). (
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Embattled city Comptroller John Liu’s ex-campaign treasurer and a former fund-raiser face decades in federal prison after being convicted yesterday of trying to scam matching funds from the city’s Campaign Finance Board.
Liu wasn’t charged in the case — which followed a lengthy federal probe of “straw” donations to his political war chest — but when asked whether the Democratic mayoral hopeful should have been, one juror told The Post, “In a way, yes.”
“In my opinion, he knew what was going on, but they couldn’t prove it,” said juror German Cruz, 41, of The Bronx.
Cruz noted Liu “was the main reason” the feds “got into the investigation.”
“He knew. It’s common sense. People who work for you know what you want,” he added.
In a statement, Liu said he was “deeply saddened by the verdict” but vowed that it wouldn’t derail his bid to succeed Mayor Bloomberg.
“I look forward to this year’s mayoral election and will continue to ask the voters for their support,” he said.
Liu also said he continued to believe that former campaign treasurer Jia “Jenny” Hou, 26, was “a good person and exceptional individual” — but offered no similar testimonial for fund-raiser Xing Wu “Oliver” Pan, 47, who got snared in the FBI sting operation that funneled $16,000 in illegal contributions to Liu’s campaign.
Pretrial court papers also revealed that the FBI wiretapped Liu’s phone during 2010 and 2011 while trying to build a case against him.
Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara said Hou and Pan had “stuck a knife into the heart of New York City’s campaign-finance law by violating the prohibition against illegal campaign contributions, all to corruptly advantage the campaign of a candidate for citywide office.”
“Cases like this give the people of New York yet another reason to be troubled by the electoral process, and they have a right to demand fair, open and honest elections untainted by cynical subversion of campaign-finance laws,” Bharara said. “With these convictions, it is our hope that some measure of the public’s confidence can be restored.”
The Manhattan federal jury delivered a split verdict against Hou, convicting her of attempted wire fraud, obstruction of justice and making false statements but acquitting her of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
Pan was convicted of both charges against him: conspiracy to commit wire fraud and attempted wire fraud.
Both defendants sat still as the verdicts, reached after just seven hours of deliberations, were read.
Sentencing was set for Sept. 20, when Hou will face a maximum 45 years and Pan will face 40.
Defense lawyers vowed to appeal.
“We believe our client is not guilty of any crime, and, unfortunately, she got caught in the middle of an obsessive quest for John Liu that went on for five years and is still going on, apparently,” Hou’s lawyer, Gerald Lefcourt, said.
Pan’s lawyer, Irwin Rochman, repeated an argument he made during his summation
“I still think Mr. Pan is collateral damage in the war against John Liu,” he said.
Additional reporting by Kate Kowsh
bruce.golding@nypost.com