Ultimately, he cares about the kids.
Disgraced New York public school executive convicted Taking bribes and serving contaminated food to city children He says his own family is “barely surviving” — as federal prosecutors seek to put him in prison for six years.
“I am pleading for mercy,” former DOE official Eric Goldstein wrote in an Aug. 23 letter, in which he sought sympathy by describing how much pain his crimes had caused his two sons and ex-wife.
“Not specifically for me, but for (his family) because without my financial, emotional and physical support I fear they will become destitute and drown.”
He also told the court: “These events have devastated my family in a way that I cannot describe in words. They are barely able to make ends meet.”
Goldstein’s appeal comes a day after he and three other defendants — Michael Turley, Brian Twomey and Blaine Iler — were convicted by a Brooklyn federal jury in 2023 on extortion and bribery charges for a bribery scheme involving Texas-based meat supplier Somma Foods.
Goldstein, 56, Somma Foods' chicken products delivered to city schools Despite recurring health problems, he took the bribe which included thousands in cash and a share in the company.
She also raised money to pay her divorce attorney, prosecutors said.
Jurors were shown disturbing photographs of some of Somma's presentations. This includes thick red liquid oozing from chicken drumsticks, and other chicken products that contain plastic, bones or metal.
In the letter, Goldstein lamented how his family — two sons and former spouse — were facing a “literal life or death” situation because of his actions, and that any prison sentence would be a “harsh punishment” for his family.
“I truly cannot imagine a more excruciating pain than to have your own family ousted, dismembered and devastated because of your actions and decisions,” said Goldstein, who acknowledges he carries an “indelible scarlet letter of guilt and failure.”
Goldstein quickly ramped up delivering Somma foods to about 2,000 schools in 2015. But the company ran into trouble meeting demand after millions of dollars worth of food orders.
Then from September 2016 to March 2017, schools reported bleeding from half-inch pieces of “wire-like metal” and blue plastic found in chickens — and a food service manager had to undergo the Heimlich maneuver after choking on a bone in a chicken tender.
It took until April 2017 for the DOE to remove all Somma products from schools after repeated complaints from students and staff, prosecutors said during the trial.
His attorneys are asking the judge to keep Goldstein out of prison because of his “fundamentally good character,” citing his 15-year tenure at the Department of Education and more than two dozen letters sent to him by family and friends.
“Eric realizes that he will only be remembered for his involvement in this case. This experience could result in his incarceration and subsequent devastation to his family, which Eric often cannot afford,” his attorneys said in their sentencing letter.
But prosecutors, who are seeking 63 to 78 months in prison for Goldstein, laughed at his lawyers trying to downplay his role in the chicken incident.
“The notion that Goldstein, who was the chief executive officer of School Support Services and was responsible for school meals, athletics and buses, was not a high-level decision-maker is patently fraudulent and should be summarily rejected by the Court,” prosecutors said in their document.
Prosecutors said Goldstein's greed also hurt potential vendors doing business with the DOE, because they “would wonder if they, too, would have to pay DOE officials to get their products approved”.
The other co-defendants could face more than five years in prison, according to federal authorities.
They will all be sentenced on Sept. 9 in Brooklyn federal court.
