Ex-Queens Councilman Dan Halloran freed from federal prison amid COVID spread

Photo via City Council/Flickr

By David Brand

A former Queens councilmember convicted for his role in two different bribery and corruption schemes was freed from federal prison June 3 after serving just over half of his 10-year sentence.

Daniel Halloran, convicted in 2014 and sentenced a year later, was released from a New Jersey lockup a few months ahead of schedule as the Bureau of Prisons seeks to reduce its inmate population and stop the spread of COVID-19. He said he did not get the illness while quarantined in the minimum-security prison. 

Halloran, who ran for Congress in 2012, told the Eagle he plans to resume his pre-politics career as a CPR and SCUBA instructor while he gets acclimated to the current state of affairs in New York City.

“It’s a little surreal, everything out there is crazy,” he said. “I came home to a world that's not quite the way it was when I left it.”

Halloran, a Republican, represented Council District 19 in Northeast Queens from 2010 to 2013, when he was arrested for his role in two corruption schemes. One case related to an effort to help another convicted lawmaker, ex-State Sen. Malcolm Smith, obtain the Republican nomination for New York City mayor. Prosecutors said Halloran received $20,000 in return for brokering bribes to enable Smith, a Democrat, to secure the GOP line.

In the second case, prosecutors said Halloran received $15,000 in exchange for diverting council money to a nonprofit.

He continues to appeal the convictions in the Second Circuit.

Before talking with the Eagle Friday, Halloran announced his release with a simple Facebook message: “And so it begins...”  

He also changed his employment status to “Former political prisoner.”