Ex-Brooklyn DA Admits To Running Campaign With City Email

BROOKLYN, NY — The former longtime Brooklyn district attorney admitted Tuesday to using his official email for his failed 2013 re-election campaign, saying he made a "mistake."

Charles Hynes, a Democrat, paid a $40,000 fine to the city's Conflicts of Interest Board, admitting in a settlement to "routinely and extensively" using his official email account and computer for campaign business and enlisting staffers in his unsuccessful bid for a seventh term.

Despite admitting to exchanging more than 5,000 campaign emails over a year and a half with campaign staff, donors, a state judge and others, Hynes lost the 2013 primary and general elections to fellow Democrat Ken Thompson, who helmed the DA's office until his 2016 death.

"In the midst of a feverishly contested primary race, I made the mistake of using my City email for campaign-related matters," Hynes, 82, said in a statement Tuesday. "If anyone is to blame for this, it should be me and me alone."

The Conflicts of Interest Board also fined four of Hynes' former aides for doing campaign work on the government's time. The staffers drafted press statements, helped their boss prepare for debates, coordinated fundraisers and tried to secure a newspaper endorsement for Hynes during the heated race five years ago, according to COIB settlements.

Jerry Schmetterer, Hynes' former chief public information officer, admitted in a settlement to using his government email, often during work hours, to correspond with his boss' campaign consultants and update Hynes on "internal campaign issues."

The COIB fined Schmetterer $6,000 for doing campaign work with government resources for more than a year.

Amy Feinstein, Hynes' chief assistant district attorney, was fined $4,500; Joanna Zmijewski, the former principal administrative associate, was fined $3,000; and Lance Ogiste, the former counsel to the district attorney and a current assistant district attorney, was fined $1,000.

Hynes said his staff "did nothing wrong and they served the public good doggedly every day they came to work."

"I hope my decision to resolve the matter early causes the COIB to leave my former staff alone," he said in a statement.

Hynes lost the job he had held for more than two decades in the 2013 race against Thompson, whose victory made him Brooklyn's first black district attorney.

Federal prosecutors investigated allegations that Hynes paid a political consultant with more than $200,000 his office had seized from criminal defendants, but dropped the probe in December 2016 after finding no evidence for criminal charges, The New York Times reported then.

This story has been updated to reflect the fact that Lance Ogiste is a current assistant district attorney in Brooklyn.

(Lead image: Former Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes speaks at a 2012 event in Brooklyn. Photo by Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images)