New York — A former New York City judge, who resigned last year while under investigation for professional misconduct, was charged Wednesday with abusing his position to defraud real estate investors out of at least $5 million and then using some of the stolen items to pay his own bills.
Edward Harold King, who left the bench at the end of last year, and Yechel “Sam” Spry, a politically connected real estate developer, were arrested by the FBI on wire fraud conspiracy charges after federal prosecutors said they duped a pair of investors into spoofing more than $6.5 million for a fake real estate showing and then failed to return all but a small portion of the money.
The allegations are similar to allegations made against King in civil suits and in complaints filed with the state Judicial Conduct Commission, whose investigation led to his resignation.
The deal described in the criminal case was “one of several schemes the government is investigating,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Wang told the judge during the men’s initial court appearance on Wednesday. Discussing Spry’s financial situation, the prosecutor said, “It’s safe to say that many, many millions of dollars” have moved through his bank accounts in the past few years.
King, 72, and Spry, 37, were released on bail and are scheduled to return to Brooklyn federal court on Monday to finalize their bond arrangements. King and his attorney, Michael Vitaliano, declined to comment as they left the courtroom. The former judge cut down trees in a nearby park to avoid journalists and photographers. Spry’s lawyer, Ezra Lent, declined to comment.
In court, Wang said that during Spry’s arrest, the developer lied to FBI agents that he did not have any electronic devices with him except his cellphone. Agents executing a search warrant confiscated the phone and then found a second phone during a Sprii search, Wang said.
If convicted, King and Spry could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.
“As alleged, the defendants stole millions of dollars from investors by exploiting King’s position as a judge to give false legitimacy to supposed investment opportunities,” U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. said in a statement.
King resigned on December 31, 2025, after only three years as judge, after the Judicial Conduct Commission informed him that it was investigating complaints reflected in his criminal case.
Among the complaints were that King was involved in a scheme to defraud real estate investors and that he continued to work as an attorney — including by accepting money into attorneys’ escrow accounts — despite rules prohibiting full-time judges from practicing law, serving as fiduciaries or engaging in business activities, the commission said. King denied these accusations.
According to federal prosecutors, King and Spry promoted fictitious investment opportunities to investors with false promises that their funds would remain safe in the attorneys’ escrow accounts and would be returned upon request if the investors decided to terminate their participation.
In November 2024, prosecutors said, Spry and King offered two investors the opportunity to buy commercial real estate in Freehold, New Jersey, through a bankruptcy auction. In order to proceed, Spry told them, all bidders first needed to show “proof of liquidity” and could do so by depositing $6.5 million into King’s escrow account, prosecutors said. Spry told investors that King was an independent escrow agent and judge, according to prosecutors.
Investors transferred the money to King’s account, where they were told it would be left untouched and would not be spent or transferred without their permission, prosecutors said. Within days, King and Spry transferred several million dollars to a bank account in Spry’s name, prosecutors said.
Later, when investors exercised their right to get the money back, King offered excuses and alternatives, at one point saying he would ask his lawyers to deposit the money with an unspecified court, prosecutors said. King and Spry eventually returned $1.5 million to investors, but have yet to pay the rest, prosecutors said.
King became a judge in 2023. He won a seat on the New York City Civil Court in Brooklyn and was appointed to the state trial court in June 2024.
Before that he was in private practice and, according to news articles about his campaign, was appointed by the courts to manage assets in real estate disputes. He also served as an administrative law judge in the city’s parking violations office and as legal counsel to the state Assembly.
When the state commission accepted King’s resignation, its director, Robert Tembekjian, called the allegations “so scandalous as to warrant his permanent departure from the bench.”