By Shayna Jacobs
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A former chief inspector charged with accepting more than $10,000 in bribes to bypass required tests on construction-site cranes pleaded guilty Tuesday in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Former Department of Buildings acting Chief Inspector James Delayo, 61, admitted in court to taking payments ranging from $200 to $500 from a crane company and filing false inspection reports indicating the cranes were safe.
Delayo acknowledged he never performed the necessary assessments for equipment provided by Nu-Way Crane Service, whose employees are also facing charges.
Delayo pleaded guilty to bribe receiving in the second degree, a felony. He faced up to 15 years in prison but was promised a sentence of two to six years as part of his plea deal.
The alleged bribes did not involve any of the cranes that collapsed at two different construction sites on the East Side in 2008, said Delayo’s attorney, David Oddo.
The cranes Delayo wrote the false inspection reports for were smaller than the tower cranes that collapsed and killed nine people within a span of months in 2008, he added.
"They were very different kinds of cranes, construction cranes that were much smaller," Oddo said.
The charges against Delayo’s co-defendants are pending. Michael Pascalli, a crane operator employed by Nu-Way, and Michael Sackaris, the crane company’s owner, are scheduled to reappear on April 9.
