Press Releases
Viewing Notice: Portable Document Format (".PDF") files may be viewed with the free Adobe Acrobat Reader.
March 2009 News Releases
3/13/09 A federal grand jury has charged Rocco DeSimone, of Johnston, with conning an inventor and defrauding investors with fraudulent claims about marketing three inventions ...more
3/5/09 Josefina Lorenzi, of Providence, pleaded guilty today to submitting a fraudulent claim to the United States Treasury. Lorenzi admitted that she participated in a scheme to obtain fraudulent refund checks ...more
February 2009 News Releases
2/27/09 A federal judge today sentenced Alvin Murray, 34, to ten years in prison for a robbery at a Sovereign Bank branch in Cumberland in June ...more
2/20/09 Eric Smyth, of Newport, pleaded guilty today to cocaine trafficking. In October, DEA Task Force agents and police detectives seized about two pounds of cocaine from Smyth ...more
2/11/09 A federal grand jury has charged seven men with various drug trafficking and firearms offenses in connection with an undercover investigation based at a Providence convenience store ...more
2/10/09 Three Rhode Island men have admitted selling thousands of contraband cigarettes in packages without the required Rhode Island state tax stamps ...more
2/9/09 A federal complaint filed in Providence charges Anthony St. Laurent, Sr. with solicitation to commit murder-for-hire ...more
2/6/09 A federal judge today sentenced Paul Vittorio, a former North Providence Police officer, to five months in prison plus five months home confinement for tipping off a drug dealer that he was under investigation ...more
January 2009 News Releases
1/30/09 A federal judge today sentenced Michael Bermudez, a former contract security guard at Rhode Island Hospital, to 39 months in prison for credit card fraud and identity theft ...more
1/29/09 Leonard F. Roupe pleaded guilty today to failing to register as a sex offender after taking up employment in Rhode Island. Roupe, who was convicted in Georgia of child molestation, traveled to Rhode Island last April with a carnival company ...more
1/26/09 A federal judge today sentenced Patrick Crowe, most recently of Florida, to four years in federal prison for stealing nearly $350,000 in payroll deductions for health insurance premiums and payroll taxes from two trucking firms that he owned for brief periods in 2004. ...more
1/21/09 Steven R. Ricci, an employee of C&C Rhode Island, a Providence-based metal plating and finishing company, pleaded guilty today to falsifying hazardous waste inspection logs that the company maintained ...more
1/20/09 A federal judge today sentenced Michael Macaruso, an asbestos abatement contractor, to two years in prison for extorting kickbacks from his employees and failing to report about $280,000 in income on his tax returns ...more
1/16/09 A federal judge today sentenced Daniel McGlone, of New Jersey, to two years in prison for a conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids and human growth hormone (HGH) ...more
1/9/09 A federal judge today sentenced David R. Cahill to 63 months in prison for a string of robberies he committed at banks and drug stores in Rhode Island ...more
1/8/09 Bernadine Urbanowicz, a former bookkeeper at Ledgemont Country Club in Seekonk, pleaded guilty today to bank fraud, admitting that she stole about $375,000 from the club over the course of five years by forging signatures on checks made out to petty cash ...more.
December 2008 News Releases
12/18/08 A federal judge today sentenced Daniel Tejeda, 22, of Providence, to 41 months in prison for robbing a Sovereign Bank branch in Providence and also for stealing identity information from a fellow Marine at a training camp ...more.
12/12/08 A federal judge has sentenced Omar Altamarino-Nunez to 151 months in prison and Idelfonso Betancourt-Rodriguez to 51 months for their roles in smuggling 29 kilograms of cocaine that was destined for Rhode Island ...more.
12/11/08 A federal judge has sentenced Raymond Texeira, formerly of Newport, to 151 months in prison for trafficking in about three ounces of cocaine in Providence ...more.
12/10/08 A federal judge today sentenced Michael DiTomasso to 30 months in prison for failing to register as a sex offender after moving from Milford, Massachusetts, to Woonsocket last year
...more.
12/5/08 A federal judge today sentenced travel agent Frank Serio to 15 months in prison for defrauding eight airlines and Amtrak out of $571,000 in a bogus ticket refund scheme ...more.
12/1/08 Edward Marcelli, of Woonsocket, has pleaded guilty to orchestrating a check fraud scheme in which he and other individuals used bad checks at retail stores in Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts to purchase more than $280,000 worth of merchandise ...more.
12/1/08 Angela Raposa, who owned Title America Closing Services, pleaded guilty today to a federal fraud charge, admitting that she used about $1.3 million from her company’s escrow account to pay for personal expenses ...more.
November 2008 News Releases
11/24/08 A federal grand jury has charged Nicholas Manocchio, an employee of the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA), Harold Tillinghast, a former LIUNA employee, and Gerald Diodati, a construction contractor, with conspiring to make and receive unlawful payments ...more.
11/21/08 A federal judge has sentenced Robert Cruz, 29, to ten years in prison for trafficking in heroin and possessing a firearm ...more.
11/19/08 Nancy Alexander, of Coventry, pleaded guilty today to a federal fraud charge involving about $1.7 million in counterfeit checks and money orders ...more.
11/19/08 Carmine DeTomasis, a pharmacist and co-owner of Prime Drug on Cranston Street, Providence, pleaded guilty today to misbranding drugs, illegally distributing controlled substances, and health care fraud ...more.
11/18/08 Jesus Nater, 29, pleaded guilty today to making counterfeit $20 bills, admitting that he made thousands of dollars in bogus twenties and passed bills at various places in the Providence vicinity ...more.
11/14/08 A federal grand jury has charged three Rhode Island men with selling thousands of contraband cigarettes in packages without the required Rhode Island state tax stamps ...more.
11/12/08 A federal jury today found Dolores Rodriguez LaFlamme, a former employee of the Rhode Island Division of Motor Vehicles, guilty of producing fraudulent drivers’ licenses that she and coconspirators sold to individuals ...more.
11/7/08 A federal jury has found Roberto Valerio, a former clerk at a Cranston RadioShack store, guilty of conspiracy and credit card fraud for helping a former hospital security guard obtain cell phones and fraudulent credit card accounts ...more.
October 2008 News Releases
10/30/08 United States Attorney Robert Clark Corrente has appointed Assistant U.S. Attorney Terrence P. Donnelly to serve as the federal District Election Officer for Rhode Island for the 2008 general election ...more.
10/28/08 Harold Tillinghast, a former Rhode Island-based organizer for Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA), and Gerald Diodati, a construction contractor, have been charged in a federal complaint with conspiring to make and receive unlawful payments ...more.
10/28/08 Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie S. Browne has recently returned from a ten-month legal detail in Iraq. As the Regime Crimes Liaison, Ms. Browne oversaw an American group ...more.
10/23/08 A federal judge today sentenced Charlie Vu, of Jersey City, New Jersey, to 30 months in prison for money laundering ...more.
10/23/08 A federal judge has sentenced Carol M. DiPina, of Providence, to ten years in prison for drug distribution and health care fraud ...more.
10/22/08 Vincent D’Elia, owner of Falcon Maintenance Company, of Johnston, pleaded guilty today to illegally hiring undocumented aliens ...more.
10/16/08 The United States Attorney’s Office has charged Vincent D’Elia, operator of Falcon Maintenance Company, of Johnston, with illegally hiring undocumented aliens ...more.
10/15/08 A federal jury in Providence has found the Southern Union Company, the Texas-based former owner of the New England Gas Company, guilty of illegally storing mercury at a Pawtucket site ...more.
10/6/08 A federal jury today found Robert A. Urciuoli, the former president of Roger Williams Medical Center, guilty of corruptly employing former Rhode Island Senator John Celona to advance the Medical Center’s interests in the General Assembly ...more.
10/2/08 A federal grand jury has charged Tarek W. Wehbe, a physician who practiced in Rhode Island, with health care fraud, illegal distribution of controlled substances, and money laundering ...more.
September 2008 News Releases
9/29/08 A federal judge today sentenced Michael R. Robitaille, of Coventry, to 30 months in prison for bank fraud. In April, Robitaille admitted that he kited fraudulent checks ...more.
9/25/08 Louis Romanelli, 81, of Providence, pleaded guilty today to more than a dozen charges in connection with the illegal sale of prescription drugs and controlled substances such as hydrocodone and oxycodone ...more.
9/25/08 A federal judge has sentenced Kenny Barnes, of Woonsocket, to 130 months in federal prison for trafficking in crack cocaine ...more.
9/18/08 Gail DeSimone, of Johnston, pleaded guilty today to harboring a prisoner, admitting that she helped her husband, Rocco DeSimone, escape from a federal prison in New Jersey ...more.
9/17/08 Jon Wilk, of Wakefield, pleaded guilty today to income tax evasion, admitting that he failed to report about $648,000 in income that he earned through his masonry company ...more.
9/12/08 A federal judge today sentenced Jeffrey Rock, of Camarillo, California, to nine months in community confinement and six months home confinement for trafficking in human Growth Hormone (hGH) that he illegally obtained from Australia and China ...more.
9/11/08 A federal jury today found Jesus M. Gonzales, of Providence, guilty of three charges in an attempt to take delivery of a package containing almost a kilogram of cocaine and 24 pounds of marijuana ...more.
August 2008 News Releases
8/20/08 Michael Bermudez, a former contract security guard at Rhode Island Hospital, has pleaded guilty to credit card fraud and identity theft ...more.
8/19/08 Jamaal O. Gaitor, of Pawtucket, pleaded guilty today to being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. Postal inspectors and federal drug task force agents found a handgun ...more.
8/8/08 Four persons that federal agents arrested in Rhode Island court houses on July 15 on administrative immigration charges have now been charged in federal criminal complaints with document fraud ...more.
8/4/08 Daniel Tejeda, of Providence, pleaded guilty today to stealing identity information from a fellow Marine at a training camp and then opening accounts in that Marine’s name ...more.
July 2008 News Releases
7/22/08 Federal agents today arrested Nancy Alexander, of Coventry, on a complaint charging her with a fraud scheme involving about $1.7 million in counterfeit checks and money orders ...more.
7/18/08 Michael Macaruso, an asbestos abatement contractor, pleaded guilty today to extorting kickbacks from his employees ...more.
7/11/08 A federal judge has sentenced two bank robbers to two decades in prison for a robbery at a Bank Rhode Island branch in Cranston last year. ...more.
June 2008 News Releases
6/26/08 A federal grand jury in Providence has charged Leonard F. Roupe with failure to register as a sex offender after moving to Rhode Island and working in Rhode Island ...more.
6/23/08 A federal judge has sentenced Timothy Falcon, 44, of Pawtucket, to 157 months in federal prison for cocaine trafficking and firearms offenses ...more.
6/20/08 A federal grand jury in Providence has charged two Woonsocket-based machine shop owners, and the wife of one of them, with a tax fraud conspiracy in which they allegedly used a series of ruses to conceal their income and avoid paying taxes ...more.
6/19/08 A federal judge today sentenced Gustavo Granados, a citizen of Mexico, to 46 months in federal prison for illegally reentering the United States after being deported ...more.
6/18/08 A federal judge in Providence has ordered that about $2.7 million traced to illegal shipments of human Growth Hormone from GeneScience Pharmaceuticals, a Chinese hGH manufacturer, be forfeited to the U.S. government ...more.
6/12/08 Michael DiTomasso, 35, of Woonsocket, and formerly of Milford, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty today to failing to register as a sex offender after moving from Milford to Woonsocket last year ...more.
May 2008 News Releases
5/21/08 A federal jury has found Edward Perez, of Providence, guilty of trafficking in a kilogram of cocaine that was shipped from Venezuela to Rhode Island, packed inside a toy car ...more.
5/19/08 A federal grand jury has charged Jose Hilario, of Pawtucket, with possessing child pornography ...more. Click here to read the indictment.
5/19/08 A federal grand jury has charged Dolores Rodriguez LaFlamme, a former employee of the Rhode Island Division of Motor Vehicles, with producing fraudulent drivers’ licenses that were sold to individuals ineligible to legally obtain them ...more. Click here to read the indictment.
5/15/08 A federal judge today sentenced Barry Zurybida, 51, of Middletown, to 220 months in federal prison for producing and possessing child pornography ...more
5/1/08 A federal judge today sentenced Domingo Enrique Lorenzo-Ferrera to 41 months in federal prison for being in the United States illegally after having been deported ...more
April 2008 News Releases
4/30/08 A federal judge today sentenced William Harper, of Pawtucket, to 37 months in federal prison for bank robbery. Harper took about $3,600 in a robbery at the Pawtucket Credit Union on Broadway in March 2007 ...more
4/30/08 Carol M. DiPina, of Providence, has pleaded guilty to federal drug distribution and health care fraud charges ...more
4/29/08 A federal judge today sentenced Larry W. Crites, 37, of Taunton, Massachusetts to 24 months in federal prison for trying to extort money from two men in the Taunton area at the behest of Anthony St. Laurent ...more
4/24/08 A team of heavily armed FBI agents today arrested David R. Cahill at his home in Mendon, Massachusetts, following an investigation by several law enforcement agencies into a series of robberies ...more
4/23/08 Michael R. Robitaille, of Coventry, pleaded guilty today to bank fraud, admitting that he kited fraudulent checks and transfers among seven accounts at three different banks and tried to obtain about $92,000 from two of the banks ...more
4/17/08 A federal criminal complaint filed today charges Tarek Wehbe, a physician with a practice in Providence and North Providence, with health care fraud, money laundering, and illicit distribution of drugs ...more
4/14/08 A federal jury in Providence has convicted two men for their roles in smuggling 29 kilograms of cocaine from California to New England ...more
4/10/08 A federal grand jury has charged a former security guard at Rhode Island Hospital and three former RadioShack employees with a fraud scheme in which hospital patients’ identity information was allegedly used ...more
4/10/08 The federal government has filed a forfeiture complaint against assets traced to Tarek Wehbe, a physician with a practice in Providence and North Providence, alleging that he fraudulently billed Medicare ...more
4/7/08 Ralph A. DiGiacomo, a Warwick-based physician, has paid $50,000 to the United States to settle claims that he failed to adequately account for hydrocodone ...more
4/3/08 A U.S. Marine has been charged with stealing the identity of a fellow Marine who subsequently deployed to Iraq, and then opening accounts in that Marine’s name ...more
March 2008 News Releases
3/14/08 A federal judge has sentenced John P. Perras and David G. Chavez, both of West Warwick, for a fraudulent check scheme in which Chavez obtained account information of Citizens Bank account holders ...more
3/14/08 U.S. Secret Service agents today arrested a former security guard at Rhode Island Hospital and the manager of a RadioShack store in Cranston on identity theft charges ...more
3/11/08 Anthony Mancini, a federally licensed gun dealer, pleaded guilty today to selling firearms at his Cranston shop without proper record keeping ...more
3/7/08 A federal judge today sentenced Stephen Davidow to 156 months in prison for a bank robbery in Pawtucket in December 2006 ...more
3/7/08 Karim Abdullah, who was released from federal prison in 2006 after serving a sentence for street gang racketeering, has pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm and trafficking in crack cocaine ...more
3/3/08 A federal judge has fined White Broadman, Inc., a Florida based company, $794,334 for misleading marketing of an unapproved new drug ...more
February 2008 News Releases
2/27/08 Christopher M. Thibodeau and Dennis R. Evans pleaded guilty today to federal bank robbery charges, admitting that they robbed tellers of $37,000 at a Bank Rhode Island branch in Cranston last June ...more
2/22/08 A federal judge today sentenced former Rhode Island House Majority Leader Gerard M. Martineau to 37 months in federal prison ...more
2/15/08 A federal judge has sentenced George Tabora, 45, of Warwick, to eight months in prison, followed by two months home confinement, for posing as a federal officer in an attempt to extort money from a Warwick gas station owner ...more
2/8/08 A federal judge today sentenced Kacey D. Jones, 27, to serve an additional three years in prison for assaulting a guard in May 2006 at the Wyatt Federal Detention Center, Central Falls, where he was detained ...more
2/4/08 Felix Rodriguez, 31, of the Bronx, New York, pleaded guilty today to being a felon in possession of a firearm. Rodriguez admitted that he had a handgun in the waistband of his pants when he was sitting in a parked car in downtown Pawtucket last April ...more
2/1/08 A federal judge today sentenced Richard Hatch, of Newport, to 51 months in prison for evading income taxes ...more
- Opinion issued today by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, affirming the conviction of Richard Hatch
2/1/08 A federal judge today sentenced Neil Stierhoff, 52, of Providence, to 46 months in federal prison for tax evasion. In June 2007, a jury found him guilty of failing to pay taxes on about $1.2 million in income that he earned between 1999 and 2002 ...more
2/1/08 A federal jury in Providence has found Ricardo Mejia, 37, guilty of taking part in the delivery of two kilograms of cocaine outside a fast food restaurant on Broad Street, Providence, in December 2006 ...more
January 2008 News Releases
1/23/08 Cory Johnson, the former president of Mixitforme, a company that sold electronic devices over the Internet and by telephone, pleaded guilty today to fraud and money laundering ...more
1/22/08 United States Attorney Robert Clark Corrente announced today that his office intends to retry the case of U.S. v. Robert Urciuoli and Frances Driscoll, two former hospital officials accused of corruptly employing a state senator to advance the hospital’s agenda ...more
1/2/08 The United States Attorney has charged Byron Parker, of Delray Beach Florida, with selling paraphernalia used to convert anabolic steroids into an injectable form ...more
December 2007 News Releases
12/13/07 The United States Government and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island (BCBSRI) have reached an agreement under which the insurer will pay $20 million to resolve matters related to the government’s ongoing public corruption investigation ...more
12/7/07 ATF agents and Cranston Police today arrested Anthony Mancini, a Cranston gun dealer, charging him with selling firearms without proper record keeping ...more
12/6/07 A federal judge today sentenced Mikael Stepanian to 72 months in prison for stealing supermarket customers’ account data by tampering with PIN-pad terminals ...more
12/6/07 A federal judge today sentenced Tracy Angiolillo, of Pawtucket, to 188 months in federal prison for trading drugs for guns. In February, Angiolillo, considered an armed career criminal, traded crack cocaine and heroin for two guns ...more
12/4/07 A federal judge today sentenced Patrick Clyne to 27 months in months in prison for mail and tax fraud. In August, Clyne admitted that he defrauded the Rhode Island School of Design out of nearly $1,000,000 in a fraudulent billing scheme ...more
November 2007 News Releases
11/30/07 A federal judge today sentenced William Christensen, 61, of Southborough, Massachusetts, to five years in federal prison for soliciting sex with a minor over the Internet and attempting to arrange a meeting with a minor for sex ...more
11/29/07 The U.S. Attorney’s Office and Roger Williams Medical Center have agreed to terminate a Deferred Prosecution Agreement entered into in January 2006 ...more
11/19/07 A federal judge has sentenced Richard Ribeiro, of Cumberland, to eight years in prison for illegally possessing three rifles ...more
11/2/07 Former Rhode Island House Majority Leader Gerard M. Martineau pleaded guilty today to public corruption charges, admitting that he arranged personal business dealings with a pharmacy company and a health insurer, and then steered the outcome of legislation in which those companies were interested ...more
11/2/07 A federal judge today sentenced two New York physicians, one whose license to practice had been revoked, for illegally prescribing anabolic steroids and human Growth Hormone (hGH) ...more
October 2007 News Releases
10/19/07 Assistant U.S. Attorney Donald C. Lockhart was recognized today with an award from the Executive Office of United States Attorneys (EOUSA) for superior performance as an Assistant U.S. Attorney ...more
10/19/07 A federal judge today sentenced Robert Portman, a construction contractor based in North Smithfield, and his wife, Candy Portman, to home confinement and probation for failing to report $266,861 in income over three years ...more
10/18/07 Manuel Coradin, 28, of Providence, has pleaded guilty to federal drug-trafficking charges. Providence Police officers seized about 200 grams of crack cocaine, some powder cocaine, and $25,000 in cash from Coradin’s apartment on Marshall Street in July 2005 ...more
10/16/07 A federal grand jury in Providence has charged the Southern Union Company, the Texas-based former owner of the New England Gas Company, with illegally storing mercury at a Pawtucket site and with failing to report mercury spillage ...more
10/16/07 The United States Attorney's Office is conducting a review of hotels in Rhode Island to determine whether they are in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ...more
10/15/07 Oluwabusayo Ogundare, 21, most recently of Central Falls, pleaded guilty today to being a felon in possession of a firearm and possessing crack cocaine ...more
10/11/07 A federal judge today sentenced John Riccio, 63, of North Kingstown, to three months imprisonment for making a false statement on a security questionnaire that he submitted as part of his employment as baggage screener at T.F. Green Airport ...more
10/11/07 A federal grand jury has charged Michael DiTomasso, 34, with failing to register as a sex offender after moving from Milford, Massachusetts, to Woonsocket, Rhode Island, in March ...more
10/9/07 The United States government has charged former House Majority Leader Gerard M. Martineau with honest services mail fraud for engineering personal business dealings with a pharmacy company and a health insurer ...more
- U.S. Attorney Robert Clark Corrente’s prepared remarks on the charges announced against Mr. Martineau
10/1/07 A federal judge has sentenced Ronald Hill, 35, of Providence to 188 months in federal prison for trafficking in crack cocaine. On two occasions last year, Hill sold crack cocaine in Providence ...more
September 2007 News Releases
9/24/07 A federal grand jury in Rhode Island has charged a Chinese corporation, Genescience Pharmaceutical Company, its CEO, Lei Jin, and three other men with international smuggling of Human Growth Hormone ...more. Click here for remarks by U. S. Attorney Robert Corrente
9/11/07 George Tabora, 45, of Warwick, pleaded guilty today to posing as a federal officer in an attempt to extort money from a Warwick gas station owner by falsely linking him to Islamic terrorists ...more
9/7/07 A federal judge today sentenced two men to prison for tampering with supermarket PIN-pad terminals and stealing customers’ charge card and debit card account data ...more
August 2007 News Releases
8/31/07 A federal judge today sentenced Robert Viruet, 38, of Pawtucket, to a total of 181 months in federal prison for trafficking in crack cocaine and having a gun ...more
8/30/07 A federal judge today sentenced Juan Cuthbert, 22, of Providence, to 77 months in federal prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm ...more
8/30/07 William Christensen, 61, of Southborough, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty today to soliciting sex with a minor over the Internet and attempting to arrange a meeting for sex with a minor ...more
8/10/07 A federal judge today sentenced two woman to federal prison for a pair of unrelated bank robberies – one of them a failed attempt to rob a bank at a drive-in window after arriving in a hired limousine ...more
8/7/07 Patrick Clyne, of Providence, pleaded guilty today to mail and tax fraud charges, admitting that he defrauded the Rhode Island School of Design out of nearly $1,000,000 in a fraudulent billing scheme ...more
The following press releases were issued by the United States Attorney's Office for the District of Rhode Island.
Copies of indictments and other publicly available court documents can be obtained from the United States District Court in Providence at http://www.rid.uscourts.gov/.
Press releases remain on this site for four months from the time of posting and then are automatically removed. If you are seeking a press release issued longer than four months ago contact the Public Affairs Officer directly.
An indictment or information is an accusation.
A defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
All press inquiries should be made to
Thomas Connell
Public Affairs Officer
(401) 709.5032
thomas.connell@usdoj.gov