![]() CAPUTO was an LIRR employee responsible for track inspection, RUZZO, NUGENT, and BALESTRA were all LIRR foremen, and PIZZONIA is an LIRR track worker. The MTA’s operating agencies include the LIRR, a commuter railroad providing service between Manhattan and locations on Long Island.ĬAPUTO, RUZZO, NUGENT, BALESTRA, and PIZZONIA are current or former LIRR employees. The MTA runs North America’s largest transportation network, providing bus, subway and rail service to a population of more than 15 million people in New York City and the surrounding areas. The defendants frequently volunteered for overtime and then claimed to have been working lucrative overtime shifts at times when they were in fact at home or at other non-work locations, such as, in the case of CAPUTO, a bowling alley. The overtime pay the defendants claimed led to significant increases in their salary and led to them being among the highest-paid MTA employees, and in the case of CAPUTO, the highest-paid MTA employee in 2018. In sentencing CAPUTO’s codefendant NUGENT, Judge Engelmayer remarked that the defendant participated in “an orgy of overtime fraud that was carried out on an epic scale,” and remarked that “Just punishment requires a substantial sentence including real prison time” and that “The message has to be, if you get caught faking overtime, there will be significant consequences and you will spend time in prison.”Īccording to the allegations in the Complaint and Indictment filed in federal court, and the statements made in connection with the sentencings of CAPUTO, NUGENT, and BALESTRA and the prosecution of coconspirators JOSEPH RUZZO and FRANK PIZZONIA:ĬAPUTO, RUZZO, NUGENT, BALESTRA, and PIZZONIA schemed to fraudulently receive thousands of dollars in compensation from the MTA by falsely claiming to have worked hundreds of voluntary overtime hours that in fact they did not work. The public expects that public employees will show up and receive honest pay for an honest day’s work, not line their pockets with double-time or time-and-a-half pay while out bowling.” Attorney Damian Williams said: “The sentences the court imposed on the participants in this egregious overtime fraud scheme send a clear message: If you commit overtime fraud, you will go to prison. BALESTRA, who pled guilty on September 14, 2021, was sentenced on Januto a three-month term of imprisonment. NUGENT, who pled guilty on July 27, 2021, was sentenced on Novemto a five-month term of imprisonment. ![]() Judge Engelmayer had earlier sentenced two of CAPUTO’s coconspirators, JOHN NUGENT, and JOSEPH BALESTRA, to terms of imprisonment for their participation in the scheme. ![]() Engelmayer, who also imposed the sentence. ![]() CAPUTO previously pled guilty on August 26, 2021, before United States District Judge Paul A. Damian Williams, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that THOMAS CAPUTO, a longtime employee of the Long Island Rail Road (“LIRR”) who in 2018 was the highest paid employee of the entire Metropolitan Transportation Authority (“MTA”) due to extraordinarily high volumes of overtime pay, was sentenced to eight months in prison for conspiracy to commit federal program fraud by submitting time reports falsely claiming to have worked hundreds of hours of overtime that he did not in fact work, including for time he spent participating in a bowling league.
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