The former chief financial officer of the Boston Grand Prix has been sentenced to prison for his part in multiple wire fraud, aggravated identity theft and money laundering schemes.
John F. Casey of Ipswich, Massachusetts, was appointed as Boston Grand Prix CFO in January 2015. The organization made payments totaling approximately $308,292 in 2015 and $601,073 in 2016 to or on behalf of Casey, which he failed to include in the gross income he claimed on his personal tax returns for those years.
Casey also made false statements to financing companies to secure $743,000 in funding to purchase equipment for an ice rink in Peabody, which he owned between October 2013 and June 1, 2016. The money was secured by Casey when he no longer owned the rink.
In addition, Casey obtained over $145,000 in small business loans for the rink business four months after he had sold it.
He was arrested on September 29 2020 and charged with laundering the proceeds of his fraud scheme and with failing to include the income from his fraud scheme on his 2014, 2015 and 2016 personal federal tax returns.
On October 21 2021, Casey pleaded guilty to 23 counts of wire fraud, three counts of aggravated identity theft, four counts of money laundering and three counts of filing false tax returns.
Casey admitted fraudulently obtaining pandemic relief funding grants totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars by submitting at least 14 fraudulent loans applications to the Small Business Administration.
"Between April 2020 and April 2021, approximately $676,552 in COVID-19 relief funds was deposited into bank accounts controlled by Casey, and he used the vast majority of the funds for personal expenses, including a three-carat diamond ring, a six-month membership to Match.com, private school tuition, residential rent payments, living expenses, payments on personal credit card accounts, restaurant meals, car payments and luxury hotel stays," stated the US Attorney's Office of the District of Massachusetts.
On Tuesday, 58-year-old Casey was sentenced to four years in prison and three years of supervised release. He was also ordered to pay $1,998,097 in restitution and was ordered to forfeit $1,570,399.