NYCHA staffer once caught naked on work video call allowed to retire — with pension — weeks before historic bribery indictment
A NYCHA staffer who was suspended three times in as many decades — including for once appearing naked in bed with a woman during a work video call — was allowed to retire just two weeks before he was indicted in a widespread “pay-to-play” corruption scheme.
Alex Tolozano, 57, was one of 70 current and former New York City Housing Authority employees charged over an alleged $2 million, 10-year racket Tuesday — marking the largest number of federal bribery raps brought in a single day in Justice Department history.
Between 2015 and 2019, Tolozano worked as a superintendent at Webster Houses in The Bronx — during which time Manhattan federal prosecutors allege he accepted about $41,000 in kickbacks in exchange for $205,000 worth of no-bid contracts.
It’s unclear if NYCHA officials were aware that Tolozano was under federal probe when he retired in January after 35 years.
Tolozano, who worked at NYCHA since 1988, was listed in 2021 as the “Neighborhood Administrator” at the Monroe Houses in The Bronx, where he made $129,000 annually, according to city paperwork.
His last position in the city payroll records was as a “Building Superintendent” in 2023, which paid him less — roughly $95,000.
A Post crunch of city payroll records suggests that his pension may be worth $68,000 a year.
His indictment on charges of solicitation and receipt of a bribe and extortion just two weeks into his retirement wasn’t the first time Tolozano found himself in hot water.
The three-decade NYCHA vet was suspended for 30 days in April 2022, after he was caught naked in bed with a woman during a work-related video call.
The cringe-worthy 17-second clip shared on YouTube showed Tolozano seemingly lounging between the sheets in the buff before the screen briefly panned to a woman next to him.
The bizarre moment, during what otherwise appeared to be a routine video conference, drew cries of “Oh my God!” and “No!” from his shocked colleagues.
Tolozano was also temporarily suspended in 1995 and 2015, and was formally reprimanded in 2014, NYCHA sources told The City at the time.
It is unclear what the circumstances were behind the two previous suspensions and the warning – and NYCHA didn’t respond to questions Wednesday, including about why he was allowed to remain on the job and also to retire as the federal indictment loomed.
The public housing authority and the city Department of Finance did not return requests for comment about his annual pension.
Tolozano didn’t return calls Wednesday and no one answered the door at his Maywood, New Jersey home.
Among the co-defendants in the case is Juan Mercado — a residential building super with NYCHA since 2013 — who is accused of taking a staggering $314,300 in bribes from at least $1,761,000 in contracts between 2014 and 2023, according to court documents.
Mercado, 49, initially smiled as he opened the door of his West Babylon home Wednesday morning, clad in POLO Ralph Lauren pajamas dotted with what appeared to be teddy bears — before shouting to “get off [his] property!”
His modest house was nearly dwarfed by the trio of cars in his driveway, including a 2022 Honda Accord, what appeared to be a 2022 or 2021 model Mercedes and a four- or five-year-old Mustang convertible rounding out the showy fleet.
Another defendant, 63-year-old Dwarka Rupnarain, allegedly accepted at least $83,100 in bribes from $508,000 worth of contracts while serving as the superintendent for three different Bronx housing projects between 2007 and 2022, the indictment said.
The now-retired dad’s social media is littered with evidence of his champagne taste – including an interest in luxury sports cars and flashy trips abroad – which he enjoyed while residents in NYCHA projects languished with leaky ceilings and floors with holes in them.
Additional reporting by Kevin Sheehan and Reuven Fenton
