NEW YORK—A former top aide to Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo was among eight people charged Thursday in a bribery and fraud case that threatened to tarnish Cuomo’s efforts to revitalize the upstate economy and the reputation of a governor who until now had been spared from a federal prosecutor’s public corruption crusade.
Joseph Percoco, Cuomo’s former executive deputy secretary and one of his most loyal advisers, was named in a criminal complaint filed in Manhattan federal court. Percoco also worked for the Cuomo’s father, Gov. Mario Cuomo. At the former governor’s funeral last year, Andrew Cuomo called Percoco “my father’s third son who sometimes I think he loved the most.”
Joseph Percoco, executive deputy secretary for New York Gov. AP Photo/Mike Groll
