The investigation led by former New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who is now the governor of the state, exposed how placement fees and politics bought favored treatment for certain money managers. The investigation by Cuomo at the time also found similar problems existent in pension funds across the country.
Loglisci was a vice president of investment banking at Salomon Smith Barney before he joined the New York State Common Retirement Fund in 2002. He experienced an official pay cut of 70 percent for joining the pension fund – the unofficial benefits are now obvious.
Loglisci spoke before the New York state Supreme Court in lower Manhattan on Tuesday. He said, “I entered an environment where political considerations were a customary part of the decision-making process … And to may failure, I went along with it.”
However, Loglisci stands apart from other defendants in that there is no evidence that he ever received money from the “pay-to-play” scheme. He was sentenced to a conditional discharge.
A law graduate and MBA from the University of Notre Dame, Loglisci now runs a car wash business in Oklahoma. He pleaded guilty in 2010 to a violation of the state's business law, which is a felony. With the felony conviction, he would be losing his license to practice law. And, as his attorney says, “He's done in the financial sector.”
Eric Schneiderman, New York's attorney general, said in court papers that Loglisci's cooperation was “a seminal factor leading to the guilty pleas of Hevesi and Morris.” Hevesi's political consultant Hank Morris was proven to have received $19 million in fees from the “pay-to-play” scheme after Loglisci ceded his authority to Morris.
