NEW YORK – Federal authorities have arrested the president and treasurer of the Law Enforcement Employees Benevolent Association, a labor union for law enforcement officers employed by the City of New York.
The president, Kenneth Wynder, Jr., 56, a former New York State trooper who lives in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, was charged with defrauding union members by misappropriating money for the union’s annuity fund.
The treasurer, Steven Whittick, 50, of Kingston, was charged with obstructing the investigation into fraud in connection with the union and its annuity fund and making false statements to federal agents.
Wynder allegedly made hundreds of thousands of dollars of fraudulent transfers from the annuity fund to the operating account which he controlled, and regularly used the funds to his own benefit, as well as to pay for personal expenses such as a second residence, clothing, travel expenses, and the purchase of a personal car, all paid for by the union.
He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Whittick, a Department of Environmental Protection police officer, is alleged to have repeatedly lied to federal agents in an effort to obstruct that investigation despite personal involvement in some of the financial improprieties with which Wynder is charged.
After the FBI had executed a search warrant of the union offices in September 2019, Whittick is alleged to have obstructed and influenced the ongoing federal investigation by making, in two different interviews with law enforcement agents, false statements about, among other things, cash withdrawals he made from union bank accounts and annuity fund and from members’ individual accounts.
If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.
