[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he Westchester County district attorney’s office has charged six Purchase golf club employees, including two from Harrison, with multiple felonies related to the theft of unemployment benefits.
Michael Gonzales, of Linden, New Jersey; Severino Livramento, of Purchase; Edgardo Villanueva, of Cos Cob, Connecticut; Danilo Martinez, of Purchase; Jose Noguera, of Yonkers; and Ronilda De La Cruz, of Rye Brook, have each been charged with grand larceny and offering a false instrument for filing, class D and class E felonies, respectively.
The group collected a total of $109,032 in unemployment benefits to which they were not entitled, according to the district attorney’s office.
The district attorney’s case entails unemployment claims over a four-year period, 2011 to 2015, during which time the men worked at Century Golf Club, located on Anderson Hill Road in Purchase, as waiters, laundry room attendants, locker room attendants, golf course attendants, kitchen attendants and housekeeping attendants. According to Robert Wolf, a spokesman for the district attorney’s office, the men allegedly traveled out of the country while they were employed, during which time they continued to file for and collect unemployment benefits. For a person to collect unemployment, they must be present in the country.
The DA’s office also alleged that the defendants had other people file documents for them, including falsely certifying that the defendants were in the country when they were not, which is considered fraud.
The district attorney’s office collaborated with the New York State Department of Labor Office of Special Investigations and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during the investigation.
All six men pleaded not guilty at their arraignment, and are due back in court on Dec. 8.
A class D felony carries a maximum sentence of seven years. For a class E felony, the maximum sentence is four years.
