{"id":454654,"date":"2025-12-18T02:49:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T02:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/454654\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T02:49:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T02:49:11","slug":"at-least-4-nyc-judges-have-left-case-involving-bk-dem-power-broker-and-missing-2m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/454654\/","title":{"rendered":"At least 4 NYC judges have left case involving BK Dem power broker and missing $2M"},"content":{"rendered":"

At least four Brooklyn judges have bizarrely recused themselves from a legal case involving more than $2 million<\/a> in allegedly missing investor money and a longtime local Democratic power broker.<\/p>\n

Two of the jurists stepped away from the case just this week \u2014 including one who had been on the verge of issuing an arrest warrant over the mislaid funds, as well as possible sanctions against former Brooklyn Democratic Party chairman Frank Seddio<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Richard Montelione recused himself Tuesday, after Seddio announced he was retaining a lawyer who was coincidentally representing the jurist in an unrelated lawsuit, sparking a potential conflict of interest.<\/p>\n

A judge serving on a case involving longtime Brooklyn power broker Frank Seddio lasted one day before recusing himself. William C Lopez\/New York Post<\/p>\n

Following Montelione\u2019s recusal, Judge Richard Velasquez also recused himself on Tuesday, without noting a reason.<\/p>\n

Currently, Judge Francios Rivera is overseeing the lawsuit \u2014 the fifth judge assigned to the case.<\/p>\n

The saga, as first reported by The Post, began last year when a pair of international investors<\/a> put the $2 million into escrow with a Brooklyn lawyer, Mark David Graubard, to prove they had the funds necessary for potential business venture with real estate investor Sam Sprei, who has ties to Seddio.<\/p>\n

But when they tried to get their money back, the investors claim Graubard allegedly stalled and refused to even provide proof that he still had the money.<\/p>\n

The investors indicated they would report the ostensible theft to authorities \u2014 at which point Seddio initiated the lawsuit in Brooklyn Supreme Court, and was immediately granted a restraining order that blocked their efforts.<\/p>\n

Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Richard Montelione recused himself Tuesday after Seddio announced he was retaining a lawyer who is also actively representing the judge in an unrelated lawsuit.\u00a0 Paul Martinka<\/p>\n

But judges on the case have since demanded to know where the money is, and why nobody can seemingly account for it, over the last year.<\/p>\n

Last week, Montelione finally appeared ready to issue an arrest warrant for escrow agent Graubard for refusing to produce bank records, as well as sanctions sought by the investors against Seddio for months of alleged delay tactics and machinations.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Seddio announced in a letter<\/a> to the court that he was hiring attorney Imran Ansari to represent him in ongoing sanctions proceedings against him in connection to the suit he initiated.<\/p>\n

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But because Ansari was representing Montelione in an active suit against the state over judicial retirement<\/a>, the jurist immediately recused himself.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOh really, I had no idea,\u201d Seddio told The Post Wednesday of the apparent conflict of interest. \u201cI thought that case was dismissed.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cI have nothing to do with this case. Tell them to go f\u2013k themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have nothing to do with this case,\u201d Frank Seddio told The Post when reached by phone.\u00a0\u201cTell them to go f\u2013k themselves.\u201d Paul Martinka<\/p>\n

He praised the appointment of the latest judge on the case, saying \u201cGood. Rivera is one of the best judges on the bench.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Seddio insisted that he barely knows Graubard, despite at least two other state court lawsuits involving the pair.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you brought him into my office now,\u201d Seddio said, \u201che\u2019d have to reintroduce himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neither Graubard nor his attorney, Israel Goldberg, responded to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Former Brooklyn Dem heavyweight, Frank Seddio, is helping a con-art scheme to defraud investors by abusing his powerful political influence, a federal lawsuit filed in October claims. Gregory P. Mango<\/p>\n

As the gymnastics in state court continue, Seddio, Gaubard and others are facing a federal lawsuit from the jilted investors, Swiss investor Angelos Metaxas and a New Zealand firm, Pertshire Investments LP, over the alleged attempts to stymie their efforts to recoup the funds from escrow.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo person, let alone an attorney who wishes to remain one, would go to these lengths \u2014 violating multiple court orders and being held in contempt for doing so \u2014 to avoid providing a few simple records unless those records show something he absolutely does not want others to see,\u201d said attorney Lauren Zimmerman of Selendy Gay, who represents the jilted investors.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are hopeful that the state court system will not tolerate this type of brazen abuse of its process \u2014 that it won\u2019t let the public believe that the rule of law has no place in New York City,\u201d said Zimmerman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At least four Brooklyn judges have bizarrely recused themselves from a legal case involving more than $2 million…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":454655,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,1121,130983,208382,336,5248,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-454654","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-brooklyn","10":"tag-brooklyn-supreme-court","11":"tag-frank-seddio","12":"tag-lawsuits","13":"tag-metro","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-city","16":"tag-newyork","17":"tag-newyorkcity","18":"tag-ny","19":"tag-nyc","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-us-news","26":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115738297251716978","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454654\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/454655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}