Ingrid Lewis-Martin told investigators she was innocent and the Department of Correction would “take care” of her after her arrest last month, according to court filings from last month.
“Corrections will take care of me,” Lewis-Martin told investigators during her arrest processing, according to prosecutors. “I’ve been good to them.”
“I’m not afraid. I know what I did and didn’t do,” she added, according to a filing, which didn’t make clear the context in which she spoke. “This is wrong. I have God and faith. I’ll tell the judge myself — I’m not guilty.”
Lewis-Martin, former chief adviser to the mayor, was indicted in Manhattan Criminal Court in December on charges she orchestrated a $100,000 bribery scheme in which she sped up construction permits for two real estate businessmen in exchange for $100,000 in cash and checks to be spent on a Porsche and promises to invest in her son’s business ventures.
Lewis-Martin’s son, Glenn Martin II, overheard her talking to investigators and told her to “cállate la boca,” or shut your mouth, according to a separate filing.
Prosecutors intend to use the statements as trial evidence, Assistant District Attorney Guy Tardanico wrote in a letter to Arthur Aidala, Lewis-Martin’s attorney, on Dec. 30.
Neither Aidala nor Michael Cibella, an attorney for Martin II, immediately responded to a request for comment.
Lewis-Martin also apologized to her son, as well as to Raizada Vaid and Mayank Dwivedi, the real estate moguls, as she turned herself in.
“I’m sorry you’re both there because of me, because of who I am,” Lewis-Martin said, according to the filings, which were first reported by Politico.
The indictment came after months of investigation into the former top Adams official. In September, investigators with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office seized her phones and searched her Brooklyn home right after she returned to JFK Airport from a trip to Japan.
Also at the airport, federal agents also served her with a grand jury subpoena that required her testimony and documents in the probe that led to Adams’ indictment.
After being presented with the search warrant by the DA’s investigators, Lewis-Martin said: “So you’re the ones that have been listening to my phone. This is crazy. Who am I bribing? What is money laundering? Check my bank records.”
Lewis-Martin also stated that she would still be “going to the mayor’s arraignment,” according to the filings, though adding, “I don’t know how I’m going to get there.”
The mayor’s arraignment on corruption charges occurred the same day her phones were seized.
She also apologized to her travel companions who, like her, had their phones seized, including Cushman & Wakefield executive Diana Boutross and Jesse Hamilton, the city’s top real estate official.
“They’re only looking into you because of me and the mayor,” Lewis-Martin said, according to a filing.
As investigators carried out a search warrant at the home of Raizada “Pinky” Vaid, the businessman said to his wife that this was about “the woman and the mayor.”
Vaid also told an investigator his father used to tell him that “whenever you shake hands with a politician, it will cost you money,” according to a filing.