A founder of the Queens Defenders, a public defense office in New York City, is responsible for distracting tens of thousands of dollars from the organization and using it for personal expenditures, including a holiday in Bali, rent for a luxury apartment and tooth white procedures.
The founder, Lori Zeno, and her husband, Rashad Ruhani, were accused of wire fraud, the money laundering and theft of funds, according to an indictment that was not taken away on Wednesday by federal prosecutors in the eastern district of New York.
From 2024, prosecutors said, Mrs. Zeno and Mr. Ruhani used at least $ 60,000 of the organization’s funds to pay for luxury holidays, expensive dinners and a penthouse apartment that they said was used for ‘customer defense’.
Mrs Zeno helped in finding the organization in 1996 and served as her executive director from 2018 to 2025, earned more than $ 400,000 in 2023. Mr. Ruhani joined Queens Defenders in 2023 as a proponent of client and later entered into a romantic relationship with Mrs. Zeno, said officers of Justice.
Mrs Zeno was forced in January as executive director by the board of the office, after countless complaints from employees about her management of the organization, the Queens Daily Eagle reported At that time.
The Queens Defenders is one of the various non -profit organizations that are paid through city, national and federal contracts to represent criminal defendants who cannot afford to hire a lawyer.
In March, the Brooklyn defenders, another public defense organization in the city, announced That supervision of the services behind the annual city contract of $ 32 million of the Queens Defenders, on the basis of the office of the mayor of Criminal Justice.
Mr. Ruhani, 55, was arrested on Tuesday evening at Kennedy Airport. He will appear on Wednesday afternoon in the federal court in Brooklyn. Mrs. Zeno, 64, has not yet been arrested.
Lawyers for Mrs. Zeno and Mr. Ruhani could not be reached immediately for comment. Nor could a representative of the Queens defenders. A spokesperson for the mayor’s office of Criminal Justice refused to comment, with reference to ‘active investigations and lawsuits’.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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