NEW HAVEN – A federal jury in New Haven Thursday found Paul Perrotti, 47, of Middlebury, guilty of embezzling funds while serving as the Middelbury Fire Chief.
According to the evidence at trial, Perroti served as the Fire Chief of the Middlebury Volunteer Fire Department rom 1997 until 2014.
He is also a licensed electrical contractor and, since approximately 2010, has operated his own business.
In 2012 and 2013, Perrotti used town funds to pay for unauthorized personal expenses and for expenses associated with his electrical contracting business.
These payments included checks made directly payable to his employees, checks made to various vendors for supplies, and checks made to pay third parties, who ultimately passed on the payments to Perrotti.
Perrotti also submitted invoices to the town for expenses that he falsely claimed were incurred by the Fire Department but, in fact, were expenses related to his business, including bills for various vendors.
In total, the government believes that Perrotti embezzled more than $70,000 from the town.
On November 5, 2014, he was charged by indictment with three counts of theft concerning programs receiving federal funds. The jury found him guilty on two counts of the indictment, but could not reach a verdict on the other one.
The charge of theft concerning programs receiving federal funds carries a maximum term of imprisonment of 10 years. Judge Meyer scheduled sentencing for October 29.
“The U.S. Attorney’s Office, FBI and our federal law enforcement partners are committed to investigating corruption at all levels of government, and public officials who misappropriate public funds will be prosecuted,” said U.S. Attorney Deirdre M. Daly, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, in a statement. “We thank the members of the jury for their thoughtful consideration of the evidence.”
Perrotti’s attorney, Martin Minela, said they will appeal the verdict and that the judge gave them three weeks to submit appeal
Minela called the verdicts a “compromise” from the federal jury after they said they were hopelessly deadlocked during deliberations.
