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Hank Morris, a top Democratic consultant to the former state comptroller, has been sentenced to "one and one third to four years in prison, the maximum sentence available by law," according to NYS Attorney General Eric Schneidmerman's office.

Morris was a key figure in the NYS pension scandal Cuomo launched four years ago, that ensnared the former comptroller, Alan Hevesi, Obama's car czar and Democratic fundraiser Steven Rattner, and numerous other figures.

Steve Rattner, Obama's former car czar, and Andrew Cuomo's pension punching bag, proves no venue is too small to appear.

From a colleague:

Monday March 14, 2011
7:30 PM - 9:00 PM An Evening with Steve Rattner
Contact: Janet Schneider 516-466-####
jschneider@greatnecklibrary.org

Great Neck Library is very pleased to welcome Steven
Rattner back to his hometown to discuss his book "Overhaul: An Insider's
Account of the Obama Administration's Emergency Rescue of the Auto
Industry." Born and raised in Great Neck and a 1970 graduate of Great
Neck North High School, Steven Rattner led the Obama administration's
efforts to restructure the auto industry in 2009 as counselor to the
secretary of the Treasury. His book tells the dramatic story of the
precedent-shattering decision to assume control, force into bankruptcy
and completely restructure Chrysler and General Motors. The author is a
former New York Times financial reporter who also earned a place among
the top tier of Wall Street's most informed investment bankers and
corporate experts.
Location: community Room, 159 Bayview Ave. Main Bldg.

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio has hired Reshma Saujani, the financial manager who ran a primary challenge against Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney.

Saujani, who contributed to WNYC's It's A Free Country politics site, will start tomorrow, as de Blasio's deputy advocate for special initiatives. Saujani will oversee a non-profit being run out of de Blasio's office.

Saujani's challenge to Maloney gained national attention, in part because of her notable supporters, including Maureen White, Steven Rattner and Diana Taylor, and for, generally, taking a pro-Wall Street stance when beating up on the industry was the trend.

De Blasio - whose ties to the Working Families Party and labor movement - make him a contender for the 2013 mayor's race, now, conceivably, has a bit more access to the Wall Street crowd, and a formalizes his ties to a young political operative with a demonstrated ability to raise money.

Her first day is tomorrow.

Ira Stoll says Andrew Cuomo is acting like Eliot Spitzer when it comes to prosecuting Steven Rattner:

However sinister Mr. Cuomo makes this all sound, none of it amounts to Mr. Rattner doing anything wrong. The investment, far from harming the state pension fund, actually performed relatively well. From March 2005 to September 2009, the net internal rate of return for the Rattner-managed fund in which the state invested was +4.6%. That's a period for which the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 8% and the S&P 500 was down 11%. Since then, the Quadrangle fund's returns have grown to about 7%.

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It's the memorandum of law arguing for that ban in which Mr. Cuomo goes most over the top. On not one, not two, not three, but four occasions, Mr. Rattner had answered questions posed by Mr. Cuomo's lawyers. At the fifth meeting, Mr. Rattner exercised his Fifth Amendment right under the Constitution. "He expressly declined to answer based on his exercise of his Fifth Amendment rights," Mr. Cuomo's memo says, "Rattner's refusal to answer sixty-eight material questions in a Martin Act inquiry constitutes prima facie proof that he has been engaged in the fraudulent practices set forth in the complaint." If exercising the Fifth Amendment to avoid a prosecutor's perjury trap is seen as "prima facie proof" of guilt, we may as well repeal the Fifth Amendment, because it's no longer worth the parchment on which it's written.

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The disparate treatment has given rise to quiet speculation that the attorney general is mad at Mr. Rattner and Mr. Rattner's wife for siding with Kerry Kennedy in the Kennedy-Cuomo divorce or that Mr. Cuomo is peeved that Mr. Rattner rebuffed all of Mr. Cuomo's efforts to solicit him and never gave a penny to his campaign, putting Mr. Cuomo in the rare position of being a high ranking Democrat in New York to whom Mr. Rattner had never contributed. Spokesmen for Mr. Cuomo did not respond to my questions about that, though Mr. Cuomo himself has dismissed as "laughable" the idea that his treatment of Mr. Rattner is politically motivated.

We have yet to recover from the devastation wrought by the credit-default swap global caper. Now, we can look forward to sorting through the allegedly fraudulent robo-mortgage signings that helped "secure it." And stay tuned, for the perp walk generated by the latest insider trading probe that prosecutors say "may be the biggest yet."

Oh, joy.

The attentive observer might ask just how much of American "high finance" is actually a string of yet-to-be-discovered criminal conspiracies?

A colleague passes along this November 18 letter from Quadrangle to its investors, slamming former partner Steven Rattner who they say "continues his pattern of failing to take responsibility for his actions."

Hank Morris, once one of New York's most powerful political consultants, pled guilty to a felony in connection with New York State pension fund scandal. Morris, the top political advisor to former State Comptroller Alan Hevesi, admitted in court that he "intentionally engaged in fraud and deception" when he helped shape the scheme to sell access to the state's multi-billion dollar public pension fund. 

After years of working in lockstep on the blockbuster New York State pension scandal, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Attorney General Andrew Cuomo split over how to hold former auto czar Steven Rattner accountable for his alleged role in the scheme.

In his SEC settlement, Rattner will pay $6.2 million and accept a two-year ban from associating with investment advisors or broker dealers. But he admits no wrong doing. He must reapply to the SEC after his suspension.

Minutes after the SEC rolled out the details of their deal, Cuomo announced he was suing Rattner for $26 million and seeking to ban him for life from the securities business in New York.

Former auto czar Steven Rattner will pay $6.2 million as part of a settlement deal with the Securities and Exchange Commission. He has also accepted a two year ban from the securities industry.

Mayor Bloomberg's multi-billion dollar fortune will be managed a company the Mayor owns. The disclosure came yesterday in a City Conflicts of Interest Board filing.

Mayor Bloomberg is standing by one of his philanthropic advisers, Steven Rattner, who is reported to have been fined millions of dollars by the Securities and Exchange Commission for his role in a pension fund scandal. The mayor says he won't be replacing Rattner anytime soon.

In exchange for almost $1 million in campaign cash and other gifts, former New York State Comptroller Alan Hevesi admitted Thursday that he handed access to $250 million in state retiree funds to a California-based private equity firm.

New York’s former state comptroller may, or may not, admit wrongdong in the wide-ranging pension investigation that has already ensnared some of the biggest names in Democratic politics, including President Obama’s one-time car czar Steven Rattner.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that Rattner  “was given immunity from criminal prosecution for testifying in [Andrew] Cuomo's case. But he has been negotiating a potential civil settlement with the attorney general and the SEC, which has been seeking a three-year ban of Mr. Rattner from the securities industry, people familiar with the situation have previously said.”

At a campaign event in Brooklyn yesterday, I asked Cuomo if Rattner had immunity from the attorney general’s office.

Cuomo offered a non-answer.

“That is a case that is currently being investigated and being handled by the office so I can’t have any comment on that,” he said.

-Steven Rattner, President Obama's former car czar and author of Overhaul: An Insider’s Account of the Obama Administration’s Emergency Rescue of the Auto Industry in America on The Brian Lehrer Show.