The NYPD Highway Patrol unit’s budget director used his department-issued credit card to order thousands of dollars in lights, sirens and spy equipment to soup up his personal car — which he was using for an unsanctioned side gig in security, according to law enforcement sources and court papers.
Edward Rosovich — a 13-year department vet who on a rainy 2016 night fatally struck two broken-down motorists on the Long Island Expressway — is facing a felony grand larceny rap and up to seven years behind bars for the bone-headed thefts of department funds, according to the Queens District Attorney’s Office.
Rosovich — the 35-year-old Procurement and budget director for the Highway Patrol command — slipped the unauthorized personal purchases into larger, approved requisition orders beginning on Sept. 6, 2016, courts filings said.
The unauthorized goodies in that order included six Motorola two-way radios, a half-dozen single-wire earpieces, a multi-unit charger and a fancy Pelican case, totaling $2,253.
Each order was made with Rosovich’s “P-card,” described by prosecutors as essentially a department-issued credit card.
Rosovich, of Queens, next ordered two truck hitch steps at $125 a pop as part of larger purchases on Sept. 8. and Oct. 18, 2016, and a Nov. 8 haul included a $2,688 lights-and-sirens vehicle kit.
He laid low until Aug. 10, 2017, when he bought for himself a car clothes hanger and a satellite phone valued at $2,704.
And less than one month later, Rosovich hid a $1,920 trove of spy gear, including various GPS devices and bug detectors, inside a larger purchase.
Law enforcement sources told The Post that Rosovich was using the arsenal of spy gear to trick out his personal vehicle for an unauthorized side-hustle in security — part of which he ran while on the clock for the NYPD.
Internal Affairs Bureau cops got wise to Rosovich’s illegal purchases, and started keeping tabs on him in October 2017, court papers show.
Over the next several months, investigators saw Rosovich cruising around in a car equipped with several of his unapproved buys, including the hitch step and a GPS logger.
The IAB cops even saw Rosovich blow through traffic using the car’s lights and sirens package.
Rosovich was arrested Wednesday on charges of grand larceny, offering a false instrument for filing, and official misconduct.
He was sprung without bail at his arraignment in Queens Criminal Court, and is due back on May 10, public records show.
In an unrelated May 2016 incident, the off-duty Rosovich fatally slammed into two people standing outside their stalled BMW on the Long Island Expressway.
The victims — the 20-year-old man driving the BMW, and an 18-year-old female passenger — were standing outside their broken-down luxury car after an earlier crash near Exit 40 in Old Westbury.
Rosovich was driving by in his 2016 GMC Yukon when he struck the pair, sending them flying over a divider and into oncoming traffic, police said at the time.
The driver was declared dead on scene, while his passenger died at the hospital.
Two other passengers in the BMW, an 18-year-old girl and a 19-year-old man were also hospitalized.
Rosovich stayed on the scene and suffered minor injuries in the smash-up.
No criminality was suspected, and he was not arrested.
