Quantcast

The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
Read the press release here.

Correction Union Boss Gets Boot After Federal Fraud Arrest

 Norman Seabrook, right, violated union bylaws and was replaced with Elias Husamudeen, sources said.
Norman Seabrook, right, violated union bylaws and was replaced with Elias Husamudeen, sources said.
View Full Caption
Courtesy of COBA and DNAinfo/Ben Fractenberg

NEW YORK CITY — The jails union replaced its president Thursday a day after federal investigators arrested him for taking bribes to invest their pension fund with a shady financier in an ongoing probe into city corruption, union sources said.

The Correction Officers' Benevolent Association removed Norman Seabrook from his role as president and elevated the union's vice president, Elias Husamudeen, according to union sources.

The board said Seabrook violated the union's bylaws when he took $60,000 to invest COBA's pension money with Murray Huberfeld's Midtown hedge fund, Platinum Partners, sources said.

Seabrook also invested the money without getting the board's authorization, law enforcement sources said.

Seabrook was arrested Wednesday morning at his Bronx home by federal officials investigating corruption within the NYPD and City Hall, sources said.

"We are saddened and concerned by these allegations, but would point out that Mr. Seabrook is innocent of these charges until proven otherwise and we look forward to him having his day in court," Husamudeen said in his first statement as president.

Federal investigators said Huberfeld, through a mutual friend, delivered a $60,000 bribe in an $820 Ferragamo bag to Seabrook who became irate because he thought he'd get more.

Investigators are looking into whether the mutual friend, Jona Rechnitz, raised about $35,000 for Mayor Bill de Blasio's Campaign for One New York.