An attorney from Garden City was sentenced to up to 12 years in prison on Tuesday, Aug. 26, for stealing more than $6 million in connection with over 50 separate real estate transactions, according to Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly.
Daniel Boldi, 50, had pleaded guilty on Oct. 17, 2024, to 13 counts of grand larceny and one count of scheme to defraud.
The defendant was sentenced to four to 12 years in prison. Civil judgment orders in excess of $6.2 million were also issued on behalf of the 52 victims.
Donnelly said thatbetween Sept. 8, 2020, and Jan. 17, 2024, Boldi, the owner of Boldi Law Group, P.C., embezzled a total of $6,206,368 from 52 victims, ranging from individual homeowners to real estate agents, lenders, and others.
Boldi committed escrow thefts totaling $4,756,368 from victims who trusted him with the sale or purchase of their property, the DA said.
In one scheme, on Oct. 31, 2023, a couple worked with Boldi on the closing of the sale of their East Meadow home, where he acted as the settlement agent for the mortgage lender used in connection with the transaction, Donnelly said.
Upon receipt of the loan funds from the home buyer’s mortgage company, Boldi should have sent $309,367 to the couple’s mortgage lender to pay off the remainder of the mortgage on the couple’s home. But he falsely told the couple that the wire transfer from the buyer’s lender was not posted to his escrow accountnn and the funds were not available at the time of the closing, the DA said.
According to Donnelly, based upon the false representation that the funds were not posted yet, the parties agreed to a “dry closing,” and the deed to the home was held in escrow.
The DA said days later, Boldi provided the couple with a fraudulent copy of what he purported to be a wire request for the mortgage payoff amount, as proof that the funds were sent to the couple’s mortgage company, and as a result, the deed was released and the sale was completed.
However, the wire transfer was never sent to the couple’s mortgage company, the mortgage payoff funds were never provided to the lender, and the couple was forced to continue making mortgage payments on a home they no longer owned, Donnelly said.
In another scheme, the defendant also provided a private lender with fraudulent mortgage and title closing records, embezzling $1.15 million through two separate loan thefts between Sept. 8, 2020, and Nov. 7, 2023, she said.
According to bank records, Boldi used the funds he stole on various personal expenses unrelated to the victims’ transactions, including Venmo payments to other individuals and property investments, according to the DA.
