The Jersey Sting: A True Story of Crooked Pols, Money-Laundering Rabbis, Black Market Kidneys, and the Informant Who Brought It All Down

So said the gossip blog Gawker, only mildly overstating the scope of the biggest corruption bust in this notoriously corrupt state's history. Among the forty-four people arrested in July 2009 were three mayors, five Orthodox rabbis, two state legislators, and the flamboyant deputy mayor of Jersey City, Leona Beldini, who had once been a stripper using the stage name Hope Diamond. At the center of it all was a dubious character named Solomon Dwek, who had perpetrated a $50 million bank fraud before copping a plea and wearing a wire as a secret FBI undercover informant---setting up friends, partners, rabbis, and dozens of politicians. Mr. Dwek played his role like an extra in a mob movie. "I don't say anything to nobody. You don't say anything to anybody, and that's it," he declared on a surveillance tape, repeatedly referring to his fraudulent "schnookic" deals.

Full of impossible-to-make-up details and fresh revelations from the continuing trials and investigations. The Jersey Sting is the inside, untold account of a federal sting operation that moves from the streets of Brooklyn to the diners of Jersey City and all the way to Israel, a wonderful tour de force of investigative journalism by the reporting team that broke this amazing story.