Investigators of the Year
Mitra Hormozi
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Joey Lipton
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Roger Burlingame
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Daniel Brownell
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Evan Norris
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Cristina Posa
AUSA, US Attorney's Office
Christopher Prather
NYS Deputy Attorney
Amy Legow Cohn
NYS Assistant Deputy Attorney General
Jonathan Mellone
Special Agent, US Department of Labor/OIG/OLRFI
Vincent O'Hara
Special Agent, Federal Bureau of Investigation
George Pagnotta
Senior Investigator, NYS Organized Crime Task Force
Investigation and Prosecution of the Top Administration of the Gambino LCN crime family Over the past five years, Assistant United States Attorneys from the Eastern District of New York, Federal Agents and State Investigators worked collaboratively to investigate a wide array of crimes that resulted in the prosecution of 62 made members and associates of the Gambino LCN crime family. The crimes charged covered three decades, and included racketeering conspiracy, extortion, ERISA union benefit embezzlement, bribery of union officials, loan sharking, illegal gambling, and other charges. Under the authority of court-ordered eavesdropping warrants, agents and investigators monitored dozens of phones for more than 12 months, and conducted extensive surveillance of the subjects. Agents and investigators established the cooperation of a witness who, at their direction, recorded nearly 1000 conversations with Gambino family members and associates. The cooperating witness infiltrated the Gambino family over a three year period, developing evidence against every member of the top administration, including John D'Amico (acting boss), Domenico Cefalu (acting underboss), Joseph Corozzo (consigliere). The cooperating witness owned and operated a large scale trucking company through which he gained entrée to the Gambino family's control and influence over key sectors of the construction industry in and around New York City. The 80-count RICO indictment included both construction industry principals and union officials from Locals 731 and 325 of the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA). Many of the construction companies paid a "mob tax" in return for protection and permission to operate. The trucking, cement, and concrete industries in New York are critical, and the organized crime extortions charged in this case typify the activities that add millions of dollars to public and private projects in New York City, where cost overruns on large scale projects are commonplace. This indictment delivered a severe blow to organized crimes extortionate control of construction in the New York metropolitan area. The existence of organized crime influence on Federal, State, City and private construction projects deprives honest, hard-working Americans of opportunities, and inflates the cost of publicly and privately funded projects at the expense of the American taxpayer and private business. Sixty of the sixty-two defendants have pleaded guilty to charges in the case. United States v. Joseph Agate, et al. (E.D. New York)
William Brust
Senior Special Agent, US Department of Homeland Security, ICE
On Mother's Day in May 2007, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Senior Special Agent William Brust of the Resident Agent in Charge Long Island Office, SAC/NY initiated human trafficking investigation, Operation Forced Labor. Human trafficking offenses, often tantamount to modern-day slavery, have a devastating impact on vulnerable victims and societies. This investigation began when an Indonesian national was found wandering the streets of Nassau County, injured and dressed in rags. Agent Brust led an investigative team, whose skilful interviewing of this Indonesian national determined that she had fled the Muttontown residence of Varsha and Mahender SABHNANI, the wealthy owners of a lucrative world-wide perfume manufacturing and distribution company. The victim recounted her and another victim's horrific stories of being brought to the United States to work as domestic servants and being held in servitude and subjected to years of physical and psychological abuse. The abuses consisted of beatings, stabbings, scalding with hot water, slicing their ears, starvation, sleep deprivation, preventing contact with their families and threats to have their families jailed in their countries of residence. The victims were kept in a state of servitude for several years, abused and forced to labor for the SABHNANI family for up to 20 hours a day. The millionaire defendants, Mahender SABHNANI and wife, Varsha SABHNANI, brought these two adult women ("the victims") from Indonesia to the United States to work as domestic servants. The victims did not speak English and had limited education. Upon their arrival in the United States, the SABHNANIs confiscated their passports, visas, and other identification documents. The victims were kept in a continuous state of servitude, similar to slavery in the defendants' home for several years. The complicated human trafficking investigation which ensued, involved execution of multiple criminal search warrants, travel to Indonesia to conduct interviews of numerous witnesses and gathering of crime scene evidence. Agent Brust's investigative team consisted of ICE agents and local Police Officers and Detectives who tenaciously amassed overwhelming evidence to demonstrate that the SABHNANIs had severely abused the victims over the course of several years. As a result of this six-month long international investigation and ten-week internationally publicized trial, both defendants Varsha and Mahender SABHNANI were convicted on December 18, 2007, of Forced Labor, Peonage, Document Servitude and Harboring Aliens. Varsha SABHNANI was sentenced to 132 months incarceration and Mahender SABHNANI was sentenced to 40 months incarceration. A final order of forfeiture was issued against the SABHNANI residence (valued at approximately 2.1 million) to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The SABHNANIs were ordered to pay a total of $936,000.00 in restitution for back wages to the two victims. Throughout the course of this investigation Agent Brust proved himself to be a tenacious investigator and resourceful agent. Agents Brust's dedication and exemplary service has assisted in increasing the awareness of the human trafficking dilemma throughout the world.Stadnyk has been and continues to be an"invaluable part" of the El Dorado Task Force. Senior Investigator Stadnyk has receivednumerous awards throughout his career for his outstanding performance and currently holdsthe status of the senior most Senior Investigator in the New York State Police. SeniorInvestigator Stadnyk's unwavering dedication, leadership, professionalism and superiorperformance make him an indispensable asset to the law enforcement community - anddeserving of the 2008 Federal Law Enforcement Award.
Louis Florio
Officer, U.S. Customs Service and Border Protection
Officer Florio's accomplishments from 1987 to the present demonstrate a lifetime of achievement in the conduct of his law enforcement duties. I would like to highlight some of his more notable successes, which include the December 2, 2000, seizure of a large book from France that contained original signatures and correspondence of Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, Eva Braun and various high ranking Nazi officials. This book was being smuggled out of France by a rare book dealer, and was successfully returned to the French government by the U.S. Customs Service. In 2004, Officer Florio stopped an arriving passenger from Yemen who had in his possession a map of Washington, D.C., with the White House, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) building, and various monuments circled. This individual was unknown to U.S. intelligence agencies. Officer Florio coordinated the necessary notifications and received responses from various law enforcement agencies. The passenger was not arrested at the airport, but the information gleaned from this examination led to a successful investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). From 2007 and to the present, Officer Florio has seized 40 shipments of undeclared merchandise with an appraised value in excess of $1.3 million, and effected three undeclared currency seizures totaling $130,000. This year alone, Officer Florio has been responsible for the collection of more than $100,000 in fines and penalties. For these actions and more, he is an excellent candidate for a Federal Law Enforcement Foundation award.
James M. Howard
United States Marshals Service, Southern District of New York
For the past two years, Inspector James M. Howard has been assigned to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Joint Terrorist Task Force (JTTF), where he actively participates in numerous terrorist fraud investigation cases. Inspector Howard has located and arrested numerous fugitives with a link to terrorism both in the United States and internationally. James is co-case agent on a major fraud/money laundering case currently being investigated in the Southern District of New York. This case began with source reporting that alleged terrorist members were attempting to obtain counterfeit United States passports to enter the United States. Through the course of the investigation, it was determined that alleged terrorist members and sympathizers were laundering money in the United States and distributing it overseas. Some of this money was derived from the sale of counterfeit clothing and drug trafficking in the United States. Source reporting indicates that subjects both known and unknown in the New York area were also laundering money through the purchase of vehicles at auctions. The vehicles were then shipped overseas. The subjects of this investigation have been linked to investigations in New York and Los Angeles. In November 2007, five subjects were arrested in the Southern District of New York and one subject was arrested in the Central District of California and charged with money laundering and counterfeiting of clothing. James M. Howard has recently been promoted to Protective Intelligence Investigator where his responsibilities will include proactively identifying, mitigating and managing potential threats to United States Marshals Service protectees.