HALEDON, N.J. — Three men were sentenced in state court Tuesday for their roles in a scheme in which New York-Presbyterian Hospital laundry managers received bribes in exchange for steering business to a laundry supply company over a five-year period, according to Paul Di Lella, Passaic County, N.J., senior assistant prosecutor.
Michael Strauss, owner of Chempac Distributors, was sentenced to 364 days in the Passaic County Jail and five years of probation, and ordered to pay $100,000 in restitution to the hospital in monthly installments.
He was allowed to apply for a work-release program that would enable him to serve his sentence while continuing to run Chempac.
Howard O’Neill was sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to pay $100,000 in restitution to the hospital. He presented a $27,500 check as his first payment.
Joseph Liriano was entered into the Pretrial Intervention program for a one-year, probation-like sentence and ordered to pay $5,000 in restitution to the hospital.
The men pleaded guilty in June to conspiracy to commit theft by deception.
O’Neill and Liriano were laundry managers for the hospital when Strauss bribed them in exchange for directing business worth $1.2 million to Strauss’ company, DiLella says.
The men admitted billing the hospital for laundry supplies that it never received, and taking a $2,500 golfing trip to the Dominican Republic that they billed as a laundry management conference.
The men had no prior criminal convictions.
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