Eric Ulrich went to a bench trial Monday on two Manhattan bribery indictments.

Monday is a bench trial, so Judge Daniel Conviser is the fact-finder. The September 2023 indictments are the accusation, and two of them are what is actually being tried. Joseph and Anthony Livreri's guilty pleas last month are their convictions, not Ulrich's. The indictment the Post says was dismissed against Mark Caller is already off the board. Any number comes at the end of a trial the Post says will run for weeks.

The New York Post reported Monday, Oct. 19, 2026, that Eric Ulrich, 41, has a bench trial that kicks off that day before Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Daniel Conviser. The Post said Manhattan prosecutors are set to lay out a years-long scheme in which he traded political shortcuts for bribes. He was charged in September 2023 with 16 felonies across five indictments tied to three jobs, including a Queens City Council seat and a stint as a senior adviser to former Mayor Eric Adams. The Post said he lasted six months as buildings commissioner and resigned after an investigation by the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. Gothamist reported he was first elected to the Council in 2009, at 24, from a south Queens seat, and was re-elected in 2013 and 2017. Gothamist reported Adams named him buildings commissioner in May 2022 and that he resigned in November of that year. He is on trial on two of the indictments. The Post said the charges include bribery and offering a false instrument for filing.

One of those two indictments includes Michael Mazzio. The Post described him as the operator of a Brooklyn towing company and said the indictment accuses him of paying Ulrich to help speed up building and health inspections. The Post reported that prosecutors allege Ulrich used the money on a premium $10,000 Mets season-ticket plan, bespoke suits, and a painting by an apprentice of Salvador Dalí, and that he paid nearly $5,000 for 10 tickets to the 2022 Mets-Yankees Subway Series. Gothamist reported prosecutors accuse him of taking more than $150,000 in cash and other benefits, including an oil painting, a discounted apartment, and Mets tickets, of using his influence to speed a health-department inspection at a Queens pizzeria and to help an associate's daughter get a higher-paying city job, and of taking cash to cover illegal gambling, plus lying on financial-disclosure forms required of city officials in 2022. The City Reporter reported that Mazzio, owner of Mike's Heavy Duty Towing, is sitting as Ulrich's co-defendant, accused of bribing him to resolve problems with the tow company's license, and that prosecutors will allege Mazzio funded Mets season tickets worth nearly $10,000. The Post ties Mazzio to building and health inspections. The City Reporter ties him to the tow license and the season tickets.

The Post reported Ulrich was initially charged alongside six other defendants, including Joseph and Anthony Livreri, brothers who co-own Aldo's Pizzeria and Restaurant in Ozone Park. The Post and Gothamist both reported that the brothers pleaded guilty last month after admitting they paid Ulrich $4,000. The Post said the pleas were to conspiracy and bribery, and that the payment was to stop the buildings department from forcing them to vacate a business that had been burned. Gothamist said the pleas were to felony conspiracy, and that the brothers told the judge the $4,000 was to remove a vacate order on a Queens bakery after a fire. The Post reported that an indictment against real-estate developer Mark Caller, described as an Adams donor, was dismissed in January, and that the cases of Paul Grego and Victor Truta remain active. Gothamist reported that Judge Conviser last year dismissed an indictment accusing Ulrich of conspiring with a wealthy developer to push zoning approvals and to clear a homeless shelter in exchange for a discount on a condo near the shore in Rockaway Beach. Gothamist also reported the trial is on two of four indictments still remaining, which fits a case in which one indictment is already gone.

Ulrich has denied wrongdoing, Gothamist reported. His lawyer, David Jason Cohen, told Gothamist that Ulrich "never accepted bribes," that he did not receive $4,000 from the Livreris, and that he "never sold out his office." Cohen told Gothamist that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg overreached and sensationalized the charges. Bragg's spokesperson, Doug Cohen, told Gothamist that prosecutors "look forward to proving our case at trial." The Post reported that if Ulrich is convicted of bribery he faces up to a minimum of five years in prison. Gothamist reported he could face up to 15 years. Those are the figures the two outlets printed. They are exposure, not a term. The Post said the trial is expected to last several weeks. The Monday morning accounts from the Post and Gothamist did not carry opening statements. CBS New York posted a short video that morning saying opening statements were to begin, without a transcript of what was said. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.