A Brooklyn court system employee allegedly swindled nearly $70,000 from illegally forging court filings and pocketing the money, according to the District Attorney’s office.
Prosecutors slapped 55-year-old Lori Argiro-DiPietro of Staten Island with a slew of charges, including grand larceny, tampering with public records and falsifying business records, and she was arraigned on Monday before Brooklyn Justice Danny Chun on the 47-count indictment.
Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez’s office announced the charges, which accused Argiro-DiPietro of voiding around 436 cash transactions between 2020 and mid-2022 in her capacity as a Supervising Cashier of the Unified Court System in Brooklyn, where she had worked for 37 years.
She was fired from her job on August 10, 2022.
The payments were made by citizens who paid to file or obtain documents — including business certification and divorce papers, according to the DA.
In total, the illicit activities resulted in a total of at least $69,515.50 in missing funds, as Argiro-DiPietro allegedly voided the financial transactions, and kept the cash, but still provided the documents that they were seeking.
Her alleged activities were uncovered during a routine audit of cash receipts and disbursements of Kings County Clerk’s Office’s Cashier’s Office.
The Unified Court System’s Inspector General’s Office referred the case to Gonzalez’s office.
