Eric Adams Advisor delivered the refill cash reporter in a bag of fries

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A former Top City Council and the current confidant campaign to Mayor Eric Adams tried to give money to a city journalist after a Harlem campaign event on Wednesday.

The failed reward, a cash bundle in a stuffed red envelope inside an open bag of sour cream potatoes and herr onion undulation, was made by Winnie Greco, an ancient Adams ally that resigned last year of her position as a link of the mayor with the Asian community after she was attacked in multiple investigations. She recently resurfaced as a constant presence in her re -election campaign.

On Wednesday, the City Council reporter, Katie Honan, saw Greco near the announcement of the new Adams campaign office in Harlem. Later, Greco sent a text message to Honan after the event when he saw it again and asked him to meet on the other side of the campaign office street next to a TD bank.

Greco and Hono walked towards Whole Foods next to. While he was inside the store, Greco gave him the open bag of fries with the upper wrinkled upper part. Honan, thinking that it was an offer of a light snack, he told Greco more than once that he could not accept the chips, but Greco insisted that he maintained them.

The two separate forms. Before entering a nearby subway station, Honan opened the bag and discovered a red envelope inside the cash filling, at least an invoice of $ 100 and several invoices of $ 20. The journalist called Greco and told him that he could not accept the money and asked him if he was still close to be able to return it. Greco said he had left the area. Honan told him that he had to recover the money, and Greco said they could meet at some point in Chinatown.

The reporter then sent a text message to Greco: “I can’t take this, when can I return it?” She did not receive an answer.

In an interview later on Wednesday, the city asked Greco what his intention was delivering money to the journalist. In response, he said he had made “a mistake” and apologized again and again.

Ben Fractenberg/The City

“I make a mistake,” he said. “I’m very sorry. It’s a thing about culture. I don’t know. I don’t understand. I’m very sorry. I feel so bad right now. I’m very sorry, honey.”

Then he called the city back, advising that we call his lawyer, Steven Brill, and added: “

“He just wanted to be his friend,” Greco added. “I just wanted to have a good friend. It’s nothing.”

Brill denied that his client’s payment to the city’s reporter was disastrous in some way.

“I can see how this looks strange,” Brill said. “But I assure you that Winnie’s intention was purely innocent. In Chinese culture, money is often given to others in a gesture of friendship and gratitude. Winnie apologizes and ashamed for any negative impression or confusion that this may have caused.”

After the city informed the Adams campaign about the interaction with Greco, the spokesman for the campaign, Todd Shapiro, said that Greco was immediately suspended from the campaign.

“We are surprised by these reports,” Shapiro said. “Winnie Grecco [sic] It does not occupy any position in this campaign and has been suspended from all voluntary campaign activities related to the campaign. Mayor Adams had no prior knowledge of this matter. He has always demanded the highest ethical and legal standards, and his only approach remains to serve the people of New York City with integrity. “

After the interaction in Whole Foods, Honan brought the chips bag and the envelope with money to the city office and handed it to its editors. The city then contacted the city research department (DOI). Anticipating possible investigations of application of the law, the city did not open the envelope or count the money inside.

“Doi received accusations from the city and rejects more comments,” said Diane Struzzi, Doi spokesman.

Ben Fractenberg/The City

Later, on Wednesday, the federal prosecutors of the Brooklyn office, the United States prosecutor Joseph Nocella, contacted the city’s lawyers.

The United States prosecutor of Brooklyn has been investigating Greco since the beginning of last year after the FBI raided its houses in February 2024 after the city’s reports on illegal straw donations collected in the collection of Adams campaign funds he had organized.

The Doi is also investigating the accusations discovered by the city that pressed a volunteer of a campaign to do personal tasks for her in exchange for getting a work in the city.

A long history

Greco has been a fixed element of Adams’ political career for more than a decade, during which he helped him raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for his mayor’s campaigns and connected it with influential members of the Chinese-American community while accompanying him on multiple trips abroad to China.

She served for much of that time as a “unpaid” ambassador “ambassador to Brooklyn Borough Hall, without taking any official role for their political campaigns despite its prolific collection of funds.

As part of the collection of funds, he connected groups of campaign donors to Adams, and some taxpayers told the city and documented in 2023 that they did not give or were reimbursed by the managers. Making donations under the name of another person is illegal under the city’s public campaign financing program, which provides $ 8 for $ 1 in small donations of residents of New York City.

Greco also helped raise funds for a non -profit organization linked to Brooklyn Borough Hall as a member of the One Brooklyn Board, which promoted Adams initiatives and raised his profile before his career in the 2021 mayor’s office.

During those same years, Greco also collected donations for a non -profit organization, with the declared objective of erecting a “Friendship Archway” in the Chinese neighborhood of Brooklyn that would serve as an entrance door for companies and culture. That adventure, which was based on an arc of an arch endowed by a Beijing district government, collapsed, leaving some donors with questions about their contributions.

Katie honor/the city

His first appointment for paid government work occurred when Adams became mayor in January 2022. A few days after attending its inauguration of the New Year Finally, it became one of the mayors’ programmers.

Greco was so close to Adams and his intimate circle that his main advisor, Ingrid-Lewis Martin, was known for introducing Greco at events as “my sister.” Lewis-Martin is being prosecuted by Manhattan district prosecutor, Alvin Bragg, for allegedly receiving bribes and is expected to be accused on Thursday for positions of influence reduction.

In November 2023, the city reported on two cases in which the people who interacted with Greco claimed that they had used their government post.

An entrepreneur told the city that Greco allegedly demanded $ 10,000 to his non -profit organization of Archway as the cost of entry to a Chinese theme event with Adams in Gracie Mansion, for which it was a free event.

In addition, a campaign volunteer said that Greco promised to help him get a city’s job if he helped supervise his home in Bronx, which he did. After he was hired by the Adams administration, Greco continued to force him to help her with tasks related to construction and other personal businesses while he was at work, said the assistant.

The mayor’s press office and a lawyer from the hotel owners affirmed to the city that Greco paid for his stay at the hotel, but did not provide evidence.

The city’s research department opened an investigation in November 2023 after the city reports. In February 2024, the FBI assaulted the house of Bronx de Greco and a second nearby house that he had recently bought. Then he went on a medical license for a few months and returned to the City Council with a new role, and an increase in the salary of about $ 200,000.