NEW YORK–A former New York City cop and member of the supervisory committee at Municipal Credit Union and who had earlier pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $400,000 and to providing the credit union’s former CEO with opioids has been sentenced to 27 months in prison.
“I am ashamed, humiliated and broken,” Joseph Guagliardo, 63, told ore Judge Denise Cote of U.S. District Court as sentencing was imposed during a hearing held remotely, according to Crain’s New York.
As CUToday.info reported earlier, Guagliardo served on MCU’s supervisory committee and provided opiates to former CEO Kam Wong, who was sentenced to 66 months in prison in 2019 after embezzling $10 million from the credit union.
Guagliardo admitted to billing the credit union for bogus security services and for what was described as “outrageously overpriced online advertising” for an Italian-American non-profit that he controlled.
‘Betrayed the Trust’
In a statement, U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss said, “For years, Joseph Guagliardo betrayed the trust of MCU’s members, who elected him to supervise and protect MCU, by abusing his position to steal hundreds of thousands of dollars. Guagliardo did so with the complicity of the now imprisoned former CEO of the credit union, whom he provided with a steady stream of painkillers. Guagliardo will now serve a substantial prison sentence for his crime.”
During the sentencing hearing, Guagliardo, a former police officer, blamed Wong for leading him astray, reported Crain’s New York. “Wong knew people’s weaknesses,” Guagliardo said.
But Judge Cote rejected that argument, reported Crain’s, stating, “There’s a particular sadness that the defendant chose this way to make money.” Judge Cote said Guagliardo’s crimes were serious and deliberate.
Employees Falsely Accused
Stella Mendes, who at one point was interim CEO at Municipal Credit Union before it was placed into conservatorship by regulators, said Guagliardo falsely accused employees of wrongdoing and threatened to use his police connections against those who would dare speak up, according to Crain’s.
“Mr. Guagliardo treated the credit union like his own private fiefdom,” Mendes testified at the hearing. He “did not concern himself about ordinary MCU members and did not have any compunctions about betraying those members who were supposed to be his former brothers and sisters in the NYPD and FDNY” or other city employees, Crain’s reported.