Former Office Manager of Brooklyn Real Estate Management Firm Indicted for Allegedly Stealing over $100,000 from Employer
Eric Gonzalez, the acting DA of Brooklyn made an announcement regarding Crown Height’s book keeper and an ex office manager belonging to a real estate management company. Both these individuals have been indicted of tax fraud, forged instrument’s possession and grand larceny on account of stealing more than $100,000 by funneling different water billing payments into their own account. An entity known as NYC Water Assessment was allegedly created by the defendant and the checks that were supposed to be paid to NYC water were deposited into her own account.
Gonzalez said that the defendant was trusted with handling the accounts of her employer but she allegedly played a calculated fraud for stealing money. When she got asked about the missing money, she brought forward a cover up instead of coming clean. The DA also added that his office is highly committed to eliminating fraudulent cases from Brooklyn.
The defendant was identified by the acting DA as the 29 years old resident of Crown Heights, Brooklyn, named Christi-Ann Rique who got arraigned before Danny Chun, the Supreme Court Justice of Brooklyn and is being charged with grand larceny (2nd & 3rd degree), forged instrument’s criminal possession (2nd degree), tax fraud and other similar felonies. The bail was set on $5000 cash or $10000 and the defendant is expected to show up at the court on 5th April, 2017 while she is facing up to 15 prison years.
Gonzalez also told that the defendant served at a Crown Height’s property management company as a book keeper and office manager for almost 8 years. The investigation reveals that the defendant fraudulently opened up a shady entity called NYC Water Assessment while listing her business address as the official address of the entity. Two bank accounts were also opened under the name of the company while reflecting herself as the president of the corporation.
Between April 2010 to March 2016, 51 checks were allegedly embezzled by the defendant. They totaled an amount of $84,558 from different properties which were being managed by the property company she was a part of. All the checks that were supposed to be paid to NYC Water instead got deposited in the account owned by NYC Water Assessment, as revealed by the investigation. In April 2016, she was inquired about some billing irregularities by her employer when she allegedly presented different communications by NYCDEP that reflected assessments on different properties.
It was revealed by the investigation that the NYCDEP website was created by the defendant along with all the email communication which alleged the DEP of the city for having a DEP Billing Assessment Program while according to the actual DEP, there is no program of such kind.
According to the investigation, the defendant was also allegedly found of stealing a number of money orders from her tenants which totaled an amount of $27,202 which incorporated rent, fines and security. The tenants were asked not to write anything in the ‘Pay to the order of’ line which she then filled with her own name. within a time span between January 2012 and June 2016, 46 altered money orders of this kind were deposited into her own bank account.
A total of $111,760 were stole by the defendant from her real estate company as unraveled by the indictment. The money was utilized in pursuing a luxury lifestyle incorporating traveling, dining, groceries and retail purchases.
Gonzalez thanked the Auditor named Natalya Sydorchuk and the Associate Attorney of NY State Dept of Taxation and Fraud named Michele Demeri as they assisted a lot during the investigation.
The investigation was carried out by Desmond Brown, Detective NYPD Brooklyn North Grand Larceny along with Ludwig Sanchez, Financial Investigator DA’s Asset Forfeiture & Crimes Against Revenue Bureau.
Maria Leonardi, the Senior ADA of DA’s Frauds Bureau prosecuted the case under authority of ADA Felice Sontupe. The case was supervised by Executive ADA William E. Schaeffer who is also the District Chief.
