On January 10, 2013, Michael Paletta, president of Crossboro Construction Contracting, was sentenced in United States District Court in the Southern District of New York (SDNY) to 3 years of probation, a $50,000 criminal fine, 100 hours of community service, and a $100 special court assessment.
On September 11, 2012, Paletta pleaded guilty to a mail fraud conspiracy. Between approximately 1994 and March 2011, Paletta, on behalf of Crossboro (a non-DBE), conspired with MS Construction (a DBE) to perform construction work on various federally-funded bridge projects in Manhattan and other boroughs where MS Construction was the purported DBE subcontractor. MS Construction was paid approximately 5% as its “fee” and relied upon Crossboro for performance of the actual work.
As part of his plea agreement, Paletta also agreed to a forfeiture of $23,813. On September 13, 2012, Crossboro agreed to a civil settlement with the SDNY to resolve a civil false claims action. The amount of the settlement was $355,164.
Links to earlier reports on this case:
- 09.13.2012 – Crossboro Construction and SDNY Agree to $355,164 Civil Settlement
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09.11.2012 – Company Official Guilty of DBE Fraud
Link to source document from the Office of Inspector General, U.S. Dept. of Transportation: http://www.oig.dot.gov/library-item/6026.
