Jersey City Councilman Bill Gaughan said after Wednesday’s City Council meeting that he had been approached by the federal government’s “cooperating witness” Solomon Dwek, but didn’t take the bait.
Dwek is the failed businessman from the Jersey Shore town of Deal who offered bribes to various local politicians that led to the arrest on July 23 of 44 public officials and religious leaders in New Jersey and New York, including Hoboken Mayor Peter Cammarano and NJ state Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith.
Gaughan said Dwek allegedly approached him about the purported development project on Garfield Avenue that would call for a condo tower.
Gaughan was not named in any of the complaints pertaining to the 44 arrested.
Gaughan did not reveal the date of the meeting, although it is believed they met before during the election season. He remembered Dwek offering no paperwork or details about his project, which made Gaughan suspicious.
“It was very obvious, I asked for plans, I asked for site control, [Dwek] had nothing,” Gaughan said. “All he had was a good line of s**t.”
Gaughan also blasted Dwek as a “con man entrapping people into a situation” who was “testing people’s greed.”- Ricardo Kaulessar