LAWFUEL – The US Legal Newswire – MICHAEL J. GARCIA, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that DAVID VELTRI, a
Carpenters Union shop steward, was sentenced today to 27 months
in prison for accepting bribes from a contractor at a union
jobsite in Brooklyn. VELTRI pleaded guilty to the offense on
June 15, 2007, and was sentenced today by United States District
Judge WILLIAM H. PAULEY III.
According to the documents filed in Manhattan federal
court and statements made at VELTRI’s sentencing proceeding:
DAVID VELTRI was a shop steward for the District
Council of New York City and Vicinity of the United Brotherhood
of Carpenters and Joiners (the “Carpenters Union”), assigned to a
construction jobsite at the Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn.
VELTRI was serving in this capacity when, from January through
May 2004, he accepted at least $8,000 in cash bribes from the
owners of Tri-Built Construction Inc. — a construction
contractor doing work at the site — in return for submitting
false shop steward reports that under-reported carpenters’ hours
to the union.
VELTRI’s conduct helped the contractor defraud the
union benefit funds out of at least $70,000 in benefits
contributions it should have paid.
In addition to the term of imprisonment, Judge PAULEY
ordered VELTRI to serve a term of 3 years supervised release and
pay a fine of $8,000. VELTRI was also ordered to pay $70,000 in
restitution to the union benefit fund.
The owners of Tri-Built, PATRICK NOEL McCAUL and JAMES
DERMOT McGONNELL, were criminally charged in a separate
Indictment in December 2006. As alleged in that Indictment, by
bribing shop stewards like VELTRI to submit fake reports,
Tri-Built’s owners avoided the detection of a long-running scheme
to defraud the union and its benefit funds by paying union
workers on its jobs cash, at a non-union rate, without the
workers receiving any benefits or tax withholdings. The charges
against McCAUL and McGONNELL remain pending, are merely
accusations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and
until proven guilty.
Mr. GARCIA thanked the U.S. Department of Labor for its
work in this investigation.
Assistant United States Attorney LISA ZORNBERG is in
charge of the prosecution.
07-270 ###
