NEW YORK (AP) — A former high-ranking official in the New York Police Department has been charged with accepting $35,000 in cash, luxury travel perks and other bribes from a Florida businessman seeking to sell panic buttons to the city’s public schools and police.
In an indictment Thursday, federal prosecutors said Kevin Taylor attempted to steer an $11 million contract toward the company, SaferWatch, while serving as the commanding officer of the NYPD’s School Safety Division. The company markets its product as a “mobile panic alert system” used for mass shootings and other emergencies.
In exchange, the company’s founder, Gene Roefaro, showered Taylor and his romantic partner with gifts — including luxury hotels and airfare to the Bahamas and Las Vegas, helicopter tours, tickets to Broadway musicals and a “medieval-themed dinner theater” — along with multiple cash payments, prosecutors said…