Brooklyn attorney pleads guilty to forging condo docs

Brooklyn real estate attorney Eduard Fridman pleaded guilty to securities fraud and forging condominium plan acceptance letters, the New York State Attorney General’s Office announced Wednesday.

Fridman said in state Supreme Court in Manhattan that he had forged six condo plan acceptance letters from the Attorney General’s Real Estate Finance Bureau and filed some of them with the city’s Department of Finance.

The forged documents allowed his clients — the developers of 282 Troy Avenue, 26 and 28 Bay 50th Street, 137 St. Nicholas Avenue And 2830 West 16th Street – to market apartments while evading the Attorney General’s oversight, according to the Brooklyn Eagle, which reported the announcement.

As part of a plea with the Attorney General, Fridman will surrender his law license and pay the state $100,000 in penalties, fees and costs. He is also banned for life from marketing or selling securities or condominiums in New York and faces a probation period of five years.

“It’s shocking that a member of the bar would forge the signatures of attorneys in my office to fraudulently sell condominiums to the public,” Attorney General Schneiderman said during the announcement. “The real estate lawyers and professionals in my office are here to protect condominium and co-op buyers from fraud, and it will remain our priority to prosecute unscrupulous lawyers like Fridman who undermine the public trust with false filings and forgeries.” [Brooklyn Eagle] – Hiten Samtani