Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office

                                 25 Kirkpatrick Street, 3rd Floor, New Brunswick, New Jersey, 08901 (732) 745-3300

 

                              *News Release*                 Date: September 21, 2011

 
 

       

 

 

 

 

 

Parking authority manager indicted in missing funds case

 

 

          Middlesex County Prosecutor Bruce J. Kaplan announced today that a former New Brunswick Parking Authority manager has been indicted by a grand jury in Middlesex County on charges of stealing more than $24,000 in parking fees.

 

          Michael Lapidus (DOB 10/21/76) of Milltown was charged by the panel in New Brunswick on September 15, 2011, with official misconduct, committing a pattern of official misconduct, theft, theft by failure to make the required disposition of property received, computer theft, misapplication of entrusted property and tampering with public records.

 

Lapidus, who had been employed as the financial operations manager for the parking authority, was charged on September 24, 2010, following an investigation by Lt. Daniel Del Bagno and Investigator Donald Heck, both of the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office.

 

During the investigation, it was determined that more than $24,000 in parking fees paid by customers at the Wolfson parking deck on Neilson Street in New Brunswick between April 1, 2007, and March 1, 2009, never were deposited into a parking authority bank account.

 

The grand jury subsequently charged that after taking cash in various amounts at various times, Lapidus altered computer records in an attempt to conceal the thefts. As a result, the grand jury included the counts of records tampering and computer theft.

 

Lapidus was the seventh parking authority employee charged in the continuing investigation into the theft of more than $100,000 in parking fees.

 

Three of the defendants have pleaded guilty and have been sentenced for their offenses.

 

In February, Thevio Eliscar (DOB 8/13/80) of New Brunswick was sentenced to serve seven years in a New Jersey State Prison, while Hicham Saadi, (DOB 4/10/71) also of New Brunswick, was sentenced to serve 364 days at the Middlesex County Adult Correction Center in North Brunswick and was placed on probation for three years.

 

Eliscar also was ordered to repay $45,000 he stole from the parking authority between May 1, 2009, and May 16, 2010. A judge required Saadi to repay $60,000 he took between November 2006 and May 16, 2010.

 

In addition, Anthony M. Williams (DOB 9/24/77) of the Colonia section of Woodbridge was sentenced in February to serve two years’ probation and was ordered to repay $650.

 

The sentences were imposed after the defendants pleaded guilty following agreements reached with Middlesex County Assistant Prosecutor Brian D. Gillet.

 

As a consequence of the plea agreements, the three men were ordered to resign their jobs and will never again hold public employment in New Jersey.

 

Anyone with information on parking authority thefts is asked to call Lt. Del Bagno or Investigator Heck at (732) 745-3300.

 

As is the case with all criminal defendants, Lapidus is presumed innocent until proven guilty.