An Inwood man has admitted to sexually abusing a teenager who worked for him and then trying to have the victim killed so that the victim couldn’t testify against him in court three years ago.
Daniel Miller pleaded guilty Tuesday at Nassau County court to charges of criminal sexual act and conspiracy. He also pleaded guilty to grand larceny for stealing more than $206,000 in a check scheme.
Prosecutors said the 47-year-old man, who owns Botanica, a religious supply store on Mott Street, gave the victim a cup containing a liquid mixed with Lorazepam, an anti-anxiety medication, and told him to drink it on Jan. 3, 2012.
After he was arrested three months later, Miller’s family helped him concoct a $15,000 murder-for-hire plot, but an informant tipped off investigators before they could hire a hit man to make the victim’s death look like a robbery, authorities said.
Miller’s mother, Mary, a secretary at a local high school, had stolen the personal records of the intended victim from the school in an attempt to facilitate the plot, prosecutors said. Mary and Miller’s sister, Ann, both pleaded guilty to conspiracy in 2013.
In addition to the sex crime and attempted hit, investigators also found that Miller was using shell companies he created to defraud three check-processing companies out of a combined $140,224 in 2009 and 2010, prosecutors said.
Those same years, he also used fake checks from nonexistent companies to con $66,180 worth of merchandise out of two companies, one of which furnishes office supplies and the other being a computer supply firm, authorities said.
Judge Angelo Delligatti is expected to sentence Miller on June 4 to nine years in prison and 10 years of post-release supervision. Prosecutors had asked the court to sentence Miller to a maximum of 18 years.
