Two Town of East Hampton Building Department employees have pleaded guilty to taking cash bribes from contractors in exchange for fast-tracking building permits and certificates of occupancy, Suffolk County prosecutors said.
Evelyn Calderon, 47, of Mastic, and Ryan Benitez, 38, of East Hampton, each pleaded guilty to five counts of third-degree bribe receiving, felonies, and five counts of official misconduct, misdemeanors.
Calderon worked as a senior office assistant and Benitez worked as a building inspector for the town, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office.
Prosecutors said the two worked together during 2024 to accept cash from contractors seeking faster approval of building permits and certificates of occupancy.
When a contractor paid a bribe, Calderon would move that contractor’s application ahead of others even though applications were supposed to be processed chronologically, prosecutors said. Calderon would then give half of the payment to Benitez, who would quickly schedule and conduct the necessary inspection.
Building permits that typically took months to obtain were issued within days after bribes were paid, according to prosecutors.
Calderon pleaded guilty Sept. 30 before Supreme Court Justice Timothy P. Mazzei. Benitez entered his guilty plea Oct. 1 before the same judge.
Both are scheduled to return to court Dec. 2 for sentencing.
The case was prosecuted by Alyssa Costantino and Patrick Rooney of the district attorney’s Public Corruption Bureau following an investigation by the office’s Public Corruption Squad, with assistance from the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office.
For more background on the allegations and how prosecutors said the scheme operated when the pair was originally charged, read LI True Crime’s earlier coverage.
