Ingrid Lewis-Martin, chief advisor to Mayor Adams until her resignation Sunday, may be charged with intervening in a city Department of Buildings process in exchange for securing DJ work for her son, Lewis-Martin’s attorney said Tuesday.
Speaking on the radio show Sid & Friends in the Morning, Arthur Aidala, said prosecutors with the Manhattan District Attorney’s office may allege that Lewis-Martin carried out the favor anticipating “that if she helped them here, somewhere down the road, it was gonna give a benefit to her son.”
The DA’s office is expected to bring an indictment against Lewis-Martin later this week.
The lawyer acknowledged he’s “not 100% sure” what the charges may be since there is no public indictment, but he said through a letter from prosecutors he received on Friday and texts and emails he is privy to he has been able to piece together the outlines of the case.
“I think what they’re gonna say is that Ingrid was asked to make a phone call to the DOB,” Aidala told host Sid Rosenberg.
“She picked up the phone, called a deputy commissioner of the DOB and said, could you go and reinspect this thing, because they’re saying they did it right, you’re saying they did it wrong,” he said, not naming the official or who requested she make the call.
Six months after that call, the same people hired Lewis-Martin’s son, Glenn Martin II, a professional DJ, “to be a DJ or some job like that,” Aidala said.
Martin II has played multiple gigs at Grace Mansion as recently as September and has a close relationship with Mayor Adams. Martin II refers to the mayor as his “uncle” and has posted photos and videos of himself appearing with the mayor in various settings, including jetskiing in the East River, according to a review of his social media accounts.
The New York Times reported that, in addition to Lewis-Martin’s son, prosecutors are looking into Mayank Dwivedi, a hotelier who operates multiple properties in the city and the Hamptons, as well as one of his business associates. He could not be immediately reached for comment.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office has been presenting evidence about Lewis-Martin to a grand jury and is expected to be close to asking the panel to vote on whether to bring charges.
The lawyer compared Lewis-Martin’s actions to a council member helping fix a pothole.
“If that’s the way we’re gonna start doing some things, or that’s how prosecutors are gonna prosecute people, then if you know a politician, then you better never ask for help,” Aidala said.
The attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
Lewis-Martin denied to reporters during a press conference on Monday that she has broken the law.
“I am here falsely accused of something; I don’t know exactly what it is, but I know that I was told that it’s something that’s illegal, and I have never done anything illegal in my capacity in government,” she said at a press conference at Aidala’s Midtown office.
The DA’s office has declined to comment on the grand jury investigation.
Lewis-Martin, 63, announced her resignation on Sunday.
The Manhattan DA’s office has been probing into her since at least September, when investigators raided her Brooklyn home and seized her cell phone at JFK. Feds with the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office also met Lewis-Martin at the airport and subpoenaed her to testify.
Aidala previously said he believed the charges would relate to “improper gifts,” and that others would be indicted, as well.
With Molly Crane-Newman and Chris Sommerfeldt