Unlicensed Nanuet Contractor Pleads Guilty To Grand Larceny, Must Repay $40,000

Rockland County District Attorney Thomas P. Zugibe today announced Michael Kubasek, 44, of 7 Village Green in Bardonia pled guilty to one felony count of Grand Larceny in the Fourth Degree. 

Zugibe said, “Kubasek, an unlicensed home improvement contractor doing business as V & J Mechanical, stole more than $40,000 from a Nanuet couple with whom he had contracted to perform renovations.”

Kubasek faces a maximum sentence of four years in state prison when he is sentenced January 10, 2014. As a condition of his plea, Kubasek is required to pay $40,000 restitution. 

Kubasek was a volunteer firefighter in Nanuet along with one of the homeowners. According to Zugibe, when Kubasek learned they wanted to make home improvements, they agreed in June 2011 he would install central air conditioning. Later on, the victims decided to add a sunroom and family room, install new windows and doors, siding, roof and make deck repairs and hired Kubasek paying him more than $40,000.

The payment came from a loan that one of the homeowners, a retired New York City firefighter borrowed against his pension. 

Kubasek allegedly did not pay the subcontractors and used the money instead to finance other projects and for personal reasons. The victims had to pay the subcontractors directly. Kubasek is accused of leaving the job and did not provide an accounting of how the money was used or return it to the homeowners. 

He was prosecuted under the New York State Lien Law, which mandates upon acceptance of funds in connection with a contract for improvement of real property or home improvement, those funds become a trust, which can be used only to pay for costs incurred in the performance of that homeowner’s project. The use of that money for any other purpose is a larceny under the Lien Law. Kubasek’s arrest resulted from an investigation by the Rockland County Special Investigations Unit and Department of Consumer Protection.

Zugibe also said that Kubasek must pay $10,000 restitution to his landlord after writing bad checks.

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