QUESTION

Do we have a criminal case of embezzlement?

Asked on Feb 12th, 2018 on Corporate Law - New York
More details to this question:
We are a housing cooperative in Queens NY. We recently found that our coop president who is a real estate agent has sold 22 rent stabilized apartments that belonged to the cooperative without knowledge of shareholders. We filed a civil lawsuit and obtained some board meeting minutes and renovation contracts for the rent stabilized apartments. The meeting minutes show that the selling of the rent stabilized apartments were not even meeting agendas. The renovation contracts had no one's signature. Gross selling prices for the 22 apartments totaled $5 millions, with 15%-21% wipe-offs every year for realtor's commissions, renovations and tenant's buyouts. Rest of the proceeds went into coop bank account. It looks like the president made selling decisions alone and profited from it. Do we have a criminal case of embezzlement?
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1 ANSWER

NA smsattorney@gmail.com
It appears that are issues with the President acting without / exceeding authority, with not disclosing a conflict of interests, and not dealing at arms length in transactions - not clear how much of the 15-21% "wipe-offs" were RE commissions paid to the President or his real estate office.  Since the balance of proceeds was placed in Coop accounts may be tougher to prove embezzlement if the money withdrawn was paid to businesses and if supported by receipts, but at the very least seems to be the misappropriation of funds & business opportunity and violation of is fiduciary duties.  In order to determine if exceeded authority and to document to provide facts to warrant a claim of embezzlement, would need to review the COOP bylaws and job description and contract for the president and if possible the closing documents and payout records to his RE company for commissions.  Also, probably worth investigating the renovations and buyout transactions to ensure payments were based on actual transactions unless the board knows the units were actually sold.  If not, would need to investigate title transfers.   The police would not likely react and investigate unless providing them with the embezzlement documented.   Certainly continuing the civil lawsuit concurrently is advised, and perhaps amending claims to include embezzlement, fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, etc. based on what the document review reveals.We would be more than happy to work with you and the board, however, we are not the cheapest lawyers in Firm. We are the most competent and aggressive attorneys when it comes to litigation. Our toll-free number for a free consultation is 877-866-8665 // Ahsan Syed, Case Manager. 
Answered on Feb 13th, 2018 at 8:58 AM

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