Indicted Lux Living Principal Hires Pam Bondi’s Brother for Defense; Calls City Inclusion Program Unconstitutional
Date Posted: July 17, 2025
Posted In: News,
From St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Sid Chakraverty, the developer indicted last year for lying about the use of minority contractors to obtain city property tax breaks, has a new lawyer: U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s brother.
In filings Tuesday in the federal case against him, Chakraverty and his co-defendants — his brother and co-developer Victor Alston and their accountant, Shijing “Poppy” Cao — ask the court to dismiss the federal wire fraud charges against them, arguing the city’s minority hiring law is unconstitutional.
Washington, D.C., lawyer Brad Bondi, the attorney general’s brother, entered an appearance in St. Louis federal court Tuesday on behalf of Chakraverty. Bondi works at the global law firm Paul Hastings, where Chakraverty’s lead defense counsel, Renato Mariotti of Chicago, is also a lawyer.
On Tuesday, Bondi and other defense lawyers filed two motions to dismiss the charges against Chakraverty, Alston and Cao, who led major regional developer Lux Living and landlords Asprient Properties and STL CityWide. The trio are accused of submitting fake documents to officials at the St. Louis Development Corp. inflating their use of minority contractors, which the city requires developers to use as part of agreements to obtain property tax breaks.
One of the motions argues that the development incentives the city granted are not “property” under federal criminal fraud statutes. A second motion to dismiss the case argues that the city’s entire minority hiring program is unconstitutional.