Former RISD manager gets 27 months for fraud

Former RISD manager gets 27 months for fraud
PROVIDENCE – Patrick Clyne, the former Rhode Island School of Design fire safety manager, was sentenced today to 27 months in prison for mail and tax fraud, according to U.S. Attorney Robert Clark Corrente.
In August, Clyne admitted to defrauding RISD of nearly $1 million in a fraudulent billing scheme, charging the school for fire-safety work that was never performed. The plea agreement included the dismissal of similar mail and tax fraud charges against his wife, Ibtisama Bradley. (READ MORE)
He was sentenced today by Chief U.S. District Court Judge Mary M. Lisi, who also ordered Clyne to forfeit any ownership interest in the property in Ballinamore, Ireland, he had purchased with proceeds from the scheme and to repay RISD $981,794.
From 1997 to November 2005, as RISD’s manager of fire safety, Clyne had been responsible for overseeing and maintaining fire safety equipment including alarm systems, emergency lighting and fire extinguishers. During that period, prosecutors said, he approved fraudulent invoices totaling $981,794 for fire safety work services performed by Ankh Electric Ltd., a shell company set up for that purpose. Checks paying for the alleged services were mailed to the shell company, prosecutors said.
At Clyne’s plea hearing in August, Andrew J. Reich, assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Rhode Island, said the government could prove Clyne had caused Ankh Electric to be incorporated and a bank account to be opened in the company’s name.
Clyne also has admitted to filing a false income tax return for 2003, failing to report all of $180,754 RISD paid to Ankh Electric that year, and has conceded a total tax loss to the government of $162,743 between 2001 and 2005.
Judge Lisi ordered Clyne to report to prison Dec. 27, but recommended that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons place him in a medical facility. Details of the 65-year-old’s condition were not revealed.
As a condition of his supervised release after he completes his prison term, Clyne must file accurate income tax returns and pay all taxes, interest and penalties due, Corrente said. The case was investigated by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation division.
Additional information is available from the Office of the U.S. Attorney, District of Rhode Island, at www.usdoj.gov/usao/ri/.