A Democratic Connecticut state senator and a former Bridgeport Board of Education chairwoman surrendered to the U.S. Marshals Service and were charged with wire fraud in a bid to allegedly obtain tens of thousands of dollars in campaign grants, officials said.
Dennis Bradley Jr., who was elected to the state Senate in 2018 and had served as the Democrat’s Deputy Majority Leader, and Jessica Martinez—his former campaign treasurer—surrendered on federal charges to the Marshals Service in New Haven, according to a federal indictment (pdf) that was unsealed on Tuesday. Martinez had previously served as the city’s Board of Education chairwoman.
“Dennis Bradley Jr. and Jessica Martinez surrendered today to the U.S. Marshals Service in New Haven. An indictment is sealed pending their court appearances this afternoon,” a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Connecticut, Tom Carson, also confirmed to Fox61.
An eight-count federal indictment charged both Bradley and Martinez with conspiracy, wire fraud, and making false statements to “fraudulently obtain or attempt to obtain” nearly $180,000 in campaign grants. They pleaded not guilty during a court appearance on Tuesday, according to a news release from the Department of Justice (DOJ).
“In his 2018 campaign for State Senate,” said DOJ prosecutors, “Bradley, and other[s] entered into a conspiracy and scheme to defraud the Connecticut State Election Enforcement Commission, the Citizens’ Election Fund, and the State of Connecticut by making misrepresentations concerning Bradley’s compliance with state election law and the Citizens’ Election Program’s statutory restrictions and requirements in order to fraudulently obtain or attempt to obtain $179,850 in campaign grants.”
State Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney removed Bradley from his Senate committee assignments, he said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Based on the current available information regarding Senator Bradley, I have taken a first step to protect the integrity of the State Senate,” Looney, a Democrat, said in the statement.
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