Man Arrested on Charges of Improperly Obtaining Handgun Licenses
A member of a volunteer security force in Borough Park, Brooklyn, was charged on Monday with offering bribes to New York Police Department officials to obtain handgun permits — the first arrest directly linked to the widening federal investigation into police corruption and Mayor Bill de Blasio’s fund-raising efforts.
The man, Alex Lichtenstein, 44, was arrested on Sunday at his home in Pomona, N.Y., by agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and detectives from the Police Department’s Internal Affairs Bureau, officials said. A criminal complaint unsealed on Monday in United States District Court in Manhattan charged him with bribery and conspiracy to commit bribery.
After offering the officer $6,000 per permit and estimating he had obtained 150 permits over the course of a year, Mr. Lichtenstein took out his calculator and multiplied $6,000 by 150, showing the officer that he stood to make $900,000 a year, the complaint said.
