Oh, and Africa Israel employed as "one of the more senior people" Jona Rechnitz, who testified Thursday that it was there that he first got into the cop-bribing business. After he left in 2011, he and his alleged partners began betting on de Blasio when their first "horse" in the mayor's race didn't place. Said the bagman: "we decided to get into the political game. We had the police going for us and now it was time to get into politics."