Ex-City Hall official name-dropped Eric Adams while encouraging mayoral campaign donors to lie to FBI, feds allege in new complaint
A recently-ousted City Hall official allegedly name-dropped Eric Adams while encouraging a mayoral campaign donor to lie to the FBI, federal prosecutors said Tuesday — as they charged the former staffer with witness tampering and destruction of evidence.
Mohamed Bahi, 40, who was arrested Tuesday morning, is the first Adams administration official to be publicly accused of crimes after the mayor’s own indictment two weeks ago on bribery and corruption charges.
The criminal complaint against Bahi was unveiled just a day after he was forced to resign as the mayor’s liaison to the Muslim community – and provides more details in Manhattan prosecutors’ case against Adams.
Bahi encouraged a businessman – who appears to be Uzbek American contractor Tolib Mansurov – and four others to lie to the feds about their illegal straw donations to Adams’ 2021 mayoral campaign, the complaint charges.
At one point, Bahi told Mansurov that the mayor, identified as “Official-1, “believed that the Businessman would not cooperate with law enforcement,” according to the court papers.
Adams, when asked during his weekly press conference about the purported exchange, largely dodged the question.
“I will never instruct anyone to do anything illegal or improper,” he twice repeated.
Prosecutor Hagan Scotten said during a hearing last week that there were “significant issues of witness interference” in the case. He said witnesses who’ll testify about their illegal campaign contributions to Adams had been contacted by people close to the mayor after being approached by the FBI.
“One of (Adams’) agents and a City Hall employee came to them carrying a message from the defendant: they should not tell the truth to the FBI, and that if they continued to lie, the crimes … wouldn’t be uncovered,” Scotten said.
The complaint against Bahi dovetails with details in the mayor’s indictment about straw donors – someone who receives funds from another person or entity to give to a political candidate, usually to skirt contribution limits or shield who’s funding politicians – arranged by Mansurov.
Mansurov used four employees at his Brooklyn construction firm to illegally make $8,000 in donations to Adams’ campaign, on top of his own $2,000 contribution – which is the highest amount allowed by an individual under city law, according to the indictment.
Two Adams campaign workers who later landed City Hall gigs asked Mansurov to contribute the $10,000, the indictment states.
The feds searched Mansurov’s home June 13, prompting him to call Bahi, the complaint against the staffer states.
Bahi that day went to Mansurov’s business, where he met with him and the four donors, court papers state.
After Mansurov told Bahi that he had denied funding straw donations to Adams when questioned by the FBI, the staffer, “Bahi advised the Businessman that if he continued to tell that lie to federal investigators the Businessman would be ok,” the papers state.
The two met again the next day, and Bahi told Mansurov that he had met with Adams and that Adams “believed that [Mansurov] would not cooperate with law enforcement.”
FBI agents raided Bahi’s home early July 24, where they took his phone and discovered he had recently deleted the Signal messaging app, the complaint states.
“When agents asked Bahi when that day he had deleted Signal, Bahi stated that he would not disclose when he deleted Signal,” according to the complaint.
The feds contend Bahi’s deletion counts as destruction of evidence.
Feds also raided the Staten Island home of another top aide to Adams, Ahsan Chughtai, on July 24, sources told The Post on Tuesday.
Chughtai, a senior advisor on South Asian and Muslim affairs was fired last week, City Hall confirmed. He could not be reached for comment Tuesday, and has not been accused of wrongdoing.
The raid had not been reported previously. The Manhattan US Attorney’s Office and the city Department of Investigation declined to comment.
Both Chughtai and Bahi volunteered for Adams’ 2021 campaign before the mayor made them senior liaisons to the Muslim community in City Hall.
Bahi founded the charity group Muslims Giving Back, which sued the NYPD more than a decade ago over the department’s surveillance of mosques and community centers after 9/11 attacks.
An administration source told The Post that Adams knew Bahi back in 2014, when his Muslim non-profit was formed.
“He was in over his head for this position and very much not liked in the community,” a source who worked with him said.
Prosecutors, during Bahi’s first appearance in Manhattan federal court later Tuesday, proposed that he be released on a $250,000 bond and on the condition that he does not speak to other potential witnesses or “co-conspirators” in the case without his lawyer present.
Bahi’s lawyer agreed, and Magistrate Judge Robert W. Lehrburger signed off on the terms, which included Bahi surrendering his passport.
Bahi, who was hauled into court in handcuffs and wearing an Under Armor polo shirt, did not comment on his way out.
Mansurov didn’t return a request for comment.
The charges against Bahi prompted another wave of criticism toward Adams, who on Tuesday vowed to finish out his term and move forward with his re-election campaign.
“This isn’t normal, even by New York City standards,” said Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens). “The culture of corruption is out of control, and City Hall officials are either resigning or being charged with crimes. With so many challenges facing this city, we can’t afford for this to continue.”
— Additional reporting by Aneeta Bhole
