90 N.Y. Lawyers May Have Collected Millions of Dollars in ‘Scam’ Pensions
Ninety lawyers in New York state may have collected tens of millions of dollars in fraudulent pensions from school districts that improperly listed them as employees, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said in a news conference yesterday.
Cuomo said he is weighing civil and criminal charges against the lawyers for what may have been “basically a payroll padding scheme” involving 180 different school districts, Newsday reports. The state investigation began in February as a result of Newsday stories about lawyers who received pensions, sometimes from multiple school districts, even though they were paid for legal advice as independent contractors.
Cuomo said some of the lawyers collecting school pensions never provided any legal services, the New York Times reports in its story on the news conference.
“It is surprising to me the level of fraud we’ve seen,” he said. “The more we dig, the worse the situation gets.”
“It was a great scam which has gone on for many years,” he said.
Cuomo said one lawyer may have collected more than $700,000 in pension benefits and was listed as an employee at seven school districts in a single year. Newsday said sources identified the lawyer as John Hogan, 78, of Binghamton. Hogan refused to comment.
Newsday contacted 14 other lawyers under investigation. All said the pensions were common practice and they did nothing wrong.
