By Joseph Spector & Jon Campbell, Gannett Albany
ALBANY - Joseph Percoco, a former top aide and confidant to Gov. Andrew Cuomo, was convicted Tuesday of three felony charges in connection with accepting more than $300,000 in payments from companies with business before the state, according to reports.
The jury indicated to the court shortly before noon that it had reached a verdict after earlier in the day asking whether it could reach a partial verdict.
When the verdict was returned, jurors convicted Percoco on two honest-services-fraud charges and one solicitation-of-bribes-and-gratuity charge. The jury found him not guilty on three others, according to various media reports.
The six-week trial ended earlier this month with jury deliberations extending into two weeks since.
Percoco was one of four defendants in the case.
Percoco, 48, of South Salem, Westchester County, is accused of collecting more than $300,000 in bribes from the co-defendants to help their companies with business before the state.
Prosecutors said he was struggling to pay for his $815,000 home and leaned on Todd Howe, a disgraced former lobbyist and one-time aide to Cuomo when he was federal housing secretary, to arrange payments from his clients to help make ends meet.
Jurors deadlocked on a charge against Peter Galbraith Kelly, a former vice president of Competitive Power Ventures, a Maryland-based company building a power plant in Orange County, according to the Courthouse News Service.
Kelly was accused of arranging a low-show job for Percoco's wife that ended up paying her $280,000 over three years and seeking Percoco's help with power plants they were building in Orange County and New Jersey.
Steven Aiello and Joseph Gerardi, top executives at Syracuse-based Cor Development, were also accused of paying Percoco $35,000 through his wife for help with their redevelopment of Syracuse's Inner Harbor and obtaining a raise for Aiello's son, who worked for Cuomo.
Aiello was convicted of a single felony, while Aiello was found not guilty, according to various media reports.