By Alfonso A. Castillo
Newsday
RIVERHEAD, N.Y. — To cover up his theft of $100,000 from the Riverhead agricultural company that employed him, James Hogan stole another $100,000 from the Riverhead Fire District of which he was chairman, Suffolk prosecutors said yesterday in court.
The case against Hogan, 56, “amounts to a classic robbing Peter to pay Paul story,” Assistant District Attorney Mark Murray said.
Hogan, who was arrested at his home Tuesday night, pleaded not guilty to second-degree grand larceny, second-degree forgery and first-degree offering a false instrument for filing.
State Supreme Court Justice Robert W. Doyle ordered Hogan held on $50,000 cash bail. Hogan’s attorney, Francis Yakavoski of Riverhead, declined to comment.
Hogan worked as a salesman for the Long Island Cauliflower Association, which is based in Riverhead and sells farming supplies. Prosecutors say that in 2005 Hogan gave two customers unapproved discounts that cost the company $100,000.
To pay back the money, Hogan persuaded fellow fire district commissioners to invest $100,000 of district funds into the Cauliflower Association, with a promise of a 6-percent return, county prosecutors said.
Officials with the association did not return calls for comment. They have said Hogan was suspended from his job.
He is no longer chairman of the fire district.
When fire district officials began pressing Hogan for documentation of their investment, Hogan forged a letter on Long Island Cauliflower Association stationery purporting to ensure that the district’s money was safe, Murray said.
When his scheme was uncovered during an independent audit of the district earlier this year, Murray said, Hogan twice attempted suicide - including by plunging a knife into his chest in June.
Hogan left behind “farewell tapes” that include him “explaining that he was at fault and not to blame anybody else,” Murray said.
Hogan has since recovered from his injuries, but “the fire district is still out $100,000,” Murray said.
In a statement, fire district officials said yesterday that they were saddened by the indictment and disappointed in Hogan, but also called him “a friend and brother firefighter to all” and wished him and his family well.
Copyright 2007 Newsday, Inc.