SOUTH KINGSTOWN – Daniel Doyle of West Hartford, Conn., was sentenced Thursday for embezzlement involving the Institute for International Sport, an organization he founded, Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin announced Thursday. The sentencing comes eight months after Doyle, now 68, was found guilty of all 18 counts charged against him in trial.
The Institute for International Sports was known for many sports-related programs, including the World Scholar Athlete Games at the University of Rhode Island.
Justice Thunberg sentenced Doyle to 15 years with seven to serve and the remainder suspended with probation on each of the seven counts of embezzlement; 10 years with five years to serve and the remainder suspended with probation on the one count of obtaining money under false pretenses; 10 years with five to serve and the remainder suspended with probation on each of the five counts of forgery; and one year suspended with probation on each of the five counts of filing a false document.
All sentences were ordered to run concurrent to one another.
Doyle has also been ordered to pay $550,000 in restitution to the Hassenfeld Foundation and undergo evaluation for further counseling.
Over the course of the trial, which began in September, the State proved Doyle had embezzled some $1.4 million from the Institute for International Sport he founded in 1986. It was proven that he had embezzled about $750,000 in unauthorized salary and loan payments between 2005 and 2011 and $150,000 in paying off the debts of his personal American Express card with funds from the organization.
Doyle additionally diverted about $100,000 from the Institute to make tuition payments for his daughter’s education at Kingswood Oxford School and Oberlin College, not to mention a $22,000 payment to Bates College.
$120,000 of Institute funding was misappropriated to purchase items associated with two of Doyle’s for-profit businesses – the Hall of Fame Press and summer camps. He additionally acquired a donation from the Hassenfeld Foundation after pledging to use the funds to construct a building associated with the Institute – funds for the building had already been obtained and lost, and the building, located on land owned by the University of Rhode Island, remains vacant.
Doyle was additionally charged with forgery in regard to his forging of individuals’ names on the Institute’s Non-Profit Corporation Annual Report between 2005-2009.
“Today’s sentence reflects the deceit DA Doyle perpetrated in his elaborate fraud that bilked honest and admirable individuals out of hundreds of thousands of dollars and destroyed the mission and purpose of the International Institute of Sport, which he founded, in order to sustain a lifestyle he felt he was entitled to,” Kilmartin said.
Kyle Borowski is a PBN contributing writer.
