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Former Nypd commissioner Bernard Kerik gets four years in federal prison

YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Calling him “a complicated man,” a federal judge sentenced Bernard Kerik to four years in federal prison Thursday.

Photo Credit: Cliffview Pilot
Photo Credit: Cliffview Pilot
Photo Credit: Cliffview Pilot


“They’re not going to be happy until I am completely annihilated,” Bernie Kerik told me earlier this year.

The main case in the eight-felony conviction centered on his allowing free renovations on his Riverdale apartment by a firm he went to bat for when it sought a contract with the city of New York.

U.S. District Judge Stephen Robinson sentenced Kerik in White Plains.


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Few men have stirred such emotion on either side, with those who’ve known his generosity pulling for him and those who view him as the embodiement of corruption saying the government can’t punish him enough:

Fact: Kerik, 54, admitted that he lied to the Bush Administration when, backed by former NYC Mayor Rudy Guiliani, he was being vetted for the job as Homeland Security chief.

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Fact: In the week after the 9/11 attacks, Kerik personally raised $10,000 for each of the 23 New York police officers killed at the World Trade Center. He then donated more than $100,000 of the earnings on his book, “The Lost Son,” to city police and firemen.

Kerik, who lives in Franklin Lakes, has insisted he’s been the victim of overzealous prosecutors out to make names for themselves: Travels with Bernie: Court of public opinion clears Kerik

Rather than take on the government, he cut a deal, resolving three pending federal trials in all.

Last fall, Robinson revoked Kerik’s bail after the former police commissioner had given confidential court documents to someone who posted them online: Kerik, seething at prosecutors, now awaits trial in jail

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He was later returned to general custody after spending 10 days in the psychiatric unit at the Westchester County Jail. A doctor gave the judge a letter that Robinson made public about Kerik’s mental state: Bernie Kerik out of psych unit

Kerik then was released in November — with electronic monitoring — so he could spend the holiday with his family before today’s sentencing: Kerik, headed for prison, goes home

It’s unclear whether Robinson counted the three months Kerik spent under home confinement toward his sentence. Unlike state sentences, federal prison terms are served nearly in their entirety.

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