The Corruption of Rudy Giuliani
In the Village Voice, Wayne Barrett reports on Rudy Giuliani's close—too close—relationship with the New York Yankees.
It's a hell of a piece of reporting.
Barrett finds that Giuliani accepted gifts of four World Series rings and over $100,000 worth of tickets to Yankee games. Such gifts would be illegal. The rings themselves, for which Giuliani apparently belatedly paid $16,000, are estimated to be worth $200,000.
No other U.S. mayor appears to be the recipient of a World Series ring.
That's in addition to oodles of Yankee paraphernalia, some of it signed and therefore valuable, that Giuliani apparently demanded of the team.
Frequently ensconced in George Steinbrenner's eight-seat 31A box and four Legends 31AA seats next to the Yankee dugout while he was mayor, Giuliani and his many guests were also repeatedly given Yankee jackets, caps, autographed balls, and other gifts. "He would require gifts at every game," says a former close Giuliani aide, whose account is supported by both a Yankee source and an ex-cop assigned to the mayor. He even wanted a fitted cap with the World Series logo and other special caps, and the equipment management had to reach into the players' uniform case to find one for Giuliani's large head. The Giuliani group also raided the closet in Steinbrenner's office, even taking DiMaggio jackets with red piping for the mayor and guests. "They finally turned the spigot off in 2000 and said we just can't do it anymore," the aide recalls. The cop remembers jackets and balls—some signed by all the Yankees—stuffed in the back of the city cars they used to drive back from the stadium.
And, though this is hardly illegal, Giuliani used to take his mistresses to Yankee games, flaunting his infidelities in full view of a television audience.
In his own book, Leadership, he revealed that the first Yankee game he ever took Judi Nathan to was David Cone's perfect game in July 1999, almost a full year before he announced at a press conference that she was his "very good friend." Judi and her girlfriends became part of his stadium entourage, just as his previous very good friend, Cristyne Lategano, had been in the earlier years. When Giuliani's wife Donna Hanover barred Lategano from the box if her son Andrew was at the game, the young press aide sequestered herself in Steinbrenner's suite, extending Giuliani's reach to the home-plate section of the stadium as well. Judi, too, eventually became a presence in the Steinbrenner suite.
In exchange, Giuliani handed the Yankees sweetheart deals on stadium lease arrangements, pushed for a heavily subsidized new stadium, arranged for $50 million in stadium planning costs, and so on.
It's great, great investigative reporting; Barrett at one point even tracks down the jeweler who made the rings, in order to determine exactly when Giuliani received them.
The piece is a reminder of Rudy Giuliani's deep-rooted conviction, remembered not-so-fondly by New Yorkers, that the law applies to everyone except for him.....
