BOSTON – A New Hampshire asbestos abatement company is paying a hefty price for a calculated scheme to cheat union workers out of their rightful benefits. AQE Inc., of Windham, NH, was sentenced today in federal court, slapped with one year of probation and ordered to fork over $500,000 in restitution to the Massachusetts Laborers Benefit Fund (MLBF).
The company pleaded guilty back in February 2017 to a laundry list of charges: 18 counts of mail fraud, one count of benefit fund embezzlement, and another 18 counts of filing false documents with an ERISA fund. The operation was a blatant attempt to skirt union obligations and pad AQE Inc.’s bottom line, officials say.
AQE Inc. routinely employed members of Tewksbury Local 1421 of the Laborers International Union of North America. When working on projects *requiring* a union signatory, they paid those workers from the AQE Inc. payroll, playing by the rules – at least superficially. But when the work didn’t demand a union company, AQE Inc. switched gears, funneling payments through a shell company, Air Quality Experts Inc., a separate entity owned by AQE Inc. This is where the scam took hold.
Union members performing the same work were paid at non-union rates, and, crucially, no contributions were made to the MLBF, which provides vital medical and pension benefits to 8,000 laborers and their families across Massachusetts. AQE Inc. further concealed the fraud by submitting deliberately falsified “remittance reports” to the MLBF, drastically underreporting the hours worked by Local 1421 members. The underreporting amounted to hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid benefits.
“This wasn’t a mistake; it was a deliberate and calculated effort to defraud hardworking union members,” stated Acting United States Attorney William D. Weinreb in a press release. Cheryl Garcia, Special Agent in Charge of the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General, and Susan Hensley, Regional Director of the Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits and Security Administration, echoed those sentiments. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Fred M. Wyshak Jr. and Ryan M. DiSantis of Weinreb’s Public Corruption Unit.
The sentence sends a clear message: exploiting union workers and stealing from their benefit funds won’t be tolerated. While a year of probation might seem light to some, the $500,000 restitution represents a significant financial blow to AQE Inc. and a small measure of justice for those whose benefits were stolen. The Department of Labor continues to investigate similar schemes, promising further crackdowns on companies attempting to cheat the system.
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Key Facts
- State: Massachusetts
- Agency: DOJ USAO
- Category: White Collar Crime|Public Corruption
- Source: Official Source ↗
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