Kerik Was Married to the Mob

I knew there was more.

Inquiry of Kerik in '00 Puts Focus on Vetting Issue

In June 2000, two months before Bernard B. Kerik was appointed police commissioner, New York City's top investigative agency learned that he had a social relationship with the owner of a New Jersey construction company suspected of having business ties to organized crime figures, city documents show.

The city's Department of Investigation took two days of testimony from Frank DiTommaso, the owner of the company, Interstate Industrial Corporation. It also formally interviewed Mr. Kerik himself. Though it is not clear what he told the investigators, there is no indication that Mr. Kerik did anything illegal or improper.

A spokesman for the Department of Investigation declined to comment yesterday when asked whether any of the information concerning Mr. Kerik and Interstate Industrial had been shared at the time with any other city officials.

But Rudolph W. Giuliani said in an interview yesterday that none of those facts were brought to his attention in August 2000 when, as mayor, he appointed Mr. Kerik as New York's top police official. And there was no indication that the White House was aware of the findings before it nominated Mr. Kerik to take over the Department of Homeland Security on Dec. 3, a nomination that has now been withdrawn.

Yeah, right, Giuliani knew nothing.