Little did North Bergen native Leonard Farinola know that when he was warbling his pipes as a singer and band director in his younger days, singing might someday protect him from an extensive jail sentence.
Figuratively, that is.
Last week, Farinola, an air conditioning and heating contractor, received a three-month jail sentence after cooperating with a federal corruption investigation into several North Bergen town officials. U.S. District Judge Joseph Greenaway deemed Farinola’s cooperation with investigators “extraordinary.”
Greenaway sentenced Farinola for bribing numerous North Bergen township officials with money, free construction work at their homes, and other services.
Officials also charged that Farinola overcharged almost $370,000 on North Bergen township and Municipal Utilities Authority contracts, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s office.
The 42-year-old contractor, now a resident of Ridgefield, was sentenced by Greenaway for “falsely inflating the number of labor hours worked and the material costs associated with his contract,” according to the release.
Technically, Farinola pleaded guilty in February 2003 to just one count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud.
Farinola’s companies, namely Fresco Air, Inc., Mechanical Contracting Services and Luxury Builders Corporation, earned approximately $2.6 million in revenue from the township and the MUA between 1993 and 2001.
In addition to his jail time, Farinola was ordered to pay $369,592 in restitution, which he agreed to make in installments of $75,000 over the next five years, and will be forced to serve three years of supervised release upon getting out of jail.
According to a written release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Newark, Farinola was described as the “central cooperator in five public corruption cases.”
Given Farinola’s level of cooperation, the government supported a downward departure from U.S. Sentencing Guidelines. In its letter recommending a sentence reduction, however, the U.S. Attorney’s Office noted that Farinola had engaged in certain post-cooperation bad conduct that had to be weighed as well, according to the release.
After the Federal Bureau of Investigation began to seize records from several different township agencies in January of 2001, it became clear whom the investigation was centered around, especially when many of the records focused on vouchers from receipts involving Farinola’s contracts.
After being approached with the information collected by federal investigators, Farinola agreed to cooperate in the investigation in June of 2001.
“Farinola admitted his culpability and expressed his desire to cooperate with federal law enforcement immediately,” states a written “Information” from the U.S. Attorney’s office. “He provided a nine-page, single-spaced statement detailing not only his fraudulent overbilling but also corrupt payments he had made to North Bergen public officials and a bid-rigging scheme in which he participated. While Farinola later was able to add more detail, his statement from the initial approach was remarkable for its breadth, detail and accuracy.”
Over the next six months, Farinola agreed to wear a wire and record, both audio and video, approximately 60 conversations he had with a variety of North Bergen officials. Some of the recorded conversations involved Farinola’s best friend, former North Bergen Township Administrator Joseph Auriemma. Auriemma pleaded guilty to fraud charges and received three years in prison and will face three years supervised release when his prison term is done. Auriemma was also fined $7,500 and ordered to pay $33,792 in restitution.
The others
As part of his cooperation with the investigation, Farinola was able to help officials gain guilty pleas from four other township officials, namely former Parks and Recreation Commissioner Peter Perez, former Public Safety Aid Vincent Zappulla, MUA purchasing agent Joseph Hernandez and contractor Domenic Grano.
Peter Perez got six months of prison, three years supervised release, a $5,000 fine and was ordered to pay $26,000 in restitution after he pleaded guilty to participating in a scheme to defraud the citizens of the township as an elected official. He is currently serving his term in a Pennsylvania prison facility.
Hernandez got 30 months in prison, three years of supervised release and was ordered to pay $18,500 in restitution after pleading guilty to one count of defrauding the MUA and the citizens of North Bergen of money, property and honest services.
Zappulla got four years probation with six months home detention, a $20,000 fine and was ordered to pay $12,264 in restitution after pleading guilty to one count of mail fraud.
Grano drew 21 months in prison, three years of supervised release and a $4,000 fine after pleading guilty to one count of defrauding the MUA and the citizens of North Bergen of the honest services of public officials.
Away from all this
Interestingly, Pasquale Giannetta, Farinola’s Wayne-based attorney, requested that Farinola serve his sentence in a facility away from the others already sentenced in the case.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Giannetta told Greenaway that his client did not receive any threats, but he worried about his client’s safety if he was recognized as an informant.
In a written memorandum to Greenaway, Clark wrote, “Farinola provided meaningful and accurate information regarding several other public corruption and fraud schemes involving North Bergen officials.”
However, the other North Bergen officials were not revealed and no other charges have been produced in the investigation in over a year.
In the government’s motion, the U.S. Attorney’s Office states that Farinola is involved in pending civil litigation that alleges that he bribed a construction code official by providing free building materials and that he libeled another party by posting derogatory fliers. Farinola, states the memorandum, admitted to government agents that he had participated in the creation and distribution of the fliers. The bribery allegation, however, remains unproved.
“[The bribery charge] bears a substantial similarity to the crimes Farinola committed in North Bergen,” prosecutors provided in a letter presented to the court. “While this conduct does not negate the considerable tangible results of his cooperative efforts, it suggests that Farinola’s cooperation was more of an act of self-preservation than any deeper change.”
Still, with the charges still hovering, Farinola received the smallest sentence from all those involved in the corruption scandal.
According to a court source, Farinola didn’t speak directly about the charges, but that his cooperation was “from the heart.”
The court source said that Farinola told Greenway, “I’m embarrassed and ashamed of myself for participating in these crimes against North Bergen. I knew it was wrong from the beginning.”
For many years, Farinola was a singer, performer, and director of a ’40s-music swing band that played throughout Hudson and Bergen counties. They also performed at municipal functions including inaugurations. It was not immediately known when Farinola would begin his prison sentence.