By MES Dispatch staff
The Briefing
• A former high-ranking New York Police Department official, Kevin Taylor, was charged Thursday with accepting bribes and other perks in connection with a panic-button contract for city schools and police, federal prosecutors said.
• Prosecutors allege Taylor accepted roughly $35,000 in cash, luxury travel and gifts from a Florida businessman while attempting to steer an $11 million contract toward the man’s company, SaferWatch.
• The indictment accuses Taylor of bribery and wire fraud, and he has pleaded not guilty in federal court.
• The Florida businessman, Gene Roefaro, also faces charges; his attorney says he may have been the target of extortion.
NEW YORK, NY — A former senior official with the New York Police Department’s School Safety Division has been indicted on federal bribery and wire fraud charges for allegedly accepting cash, travel and other perks in exchange for favoring a company seeking to sell emergency panic-button technology to the city’s public schools and police, prosecutors said Thursday.
Federal prosecutors said in an indictment that Kevin Taylor accepted about $35,000 in cash, luxury hotels, airfare and entertainment from Florida businessman Gene Roefaro while trying to steer an $11 million SaferWatch contract toward Roefaro’s company. Roefaro’s products are marketed as mobile panic alert systems for use during school emergencies.
Taylor, who led the NYPD’s School Safety Division at the time, pleaded not guilty to the charges in Manhattan federal court. He remains free pending trial, and an attorney for him did not immediately respond to an inquiry.
Roefaro also faces federal charges, including bribery and wire fraud, and has not yet entered a plea. An attorney for Roefaro asserted that his client may have been subjected to an extortion attempt, according to court filings.
Prosecutors say the investigation, which emerged in 2024, is part of a broader federal probe that has included other corruption allegations involving city officials and law enforcement officers; the SaferWatch company had previously secured a no-bid pilot contract in 2023 as part of the inquiry.