A former Long Island financial services consultant pleaded guilty Friday in a $3.2 million scheme to defraud Bank of America by submitting doctored tax returns and bank statements to secure client loans.
Gary Confredo of East Northport faces up to 30 years in prison when he is sentenced in U.S. District Court in Central Islip, prosecutors said.
Confredo, also known as Gary Conte, agreed to forfeit about $140,000 and pay restitution that will be determined at sentencing as part of his guilty plea, according to the announcement by Breon Peace, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
“Earlier today Mr. Confredo accepted responsibility for his conduct and we will start the process of sentencing mitigation immediately,” Confredo’s Garden City attorney, Joshua Kirshner, said in an emailed statement.
Prosecutors said Confredo, 60, operated Goldstar Financial Management Corp. in Commack where he helped clients secure commercial loans. The clients, in turn, paid him a portion of the loan amount received.
Between November 2016 and October 2019, Confredo and others conspired to submit phony documents that inflated clients’ assets and incomes, qualifying them for the loans, prosecutors said.
Bank of America, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, sustained losses of about $1 million when loans and lines of credit were not repaid.
“As the defendant admitted, he selfishly manipulated the trust of his clients and lied to financial institutions simply to line his own…
