A disbarred former Great Neck attorney has admitted in court that he burned through $30,000 that was supposed to sit safely in escrow for a Long Island home sale, and now he has to pay it back or risk heading to state prison.
Marco Materassi, 59, pleaded guilty on June 15 in Suffolk County Supreme Court to taking a $30,000 down payment tied to a Lake Grove home contract and spending it within four days on unauthorized business and personal charges. The money should have been held in escrow for a Jan. 26, 2024, real estate deal that ultimately fell apart, and the plea resolves Suffolk County’s criminal case connected to that canceled contract.
How prosecutors say the $30K vanished
According to Suffolk County prosecutors, Materassi was hired to represent the seller in the Lake Grove transaction and received the $30,000 down payment on Jan. 26, 2024. When the sale collapsed, all sides agreed the deposit should go back to the buyer. Instead, he stopped returning calls from the buyer, the buyer’s attorney and the seller, then allegedly drained the funds within four days on personal and business expenses, as reported by TBR News Media.
“An attorney who steals from his clients violates the public trust and his own fiduciary duty to his client,” Suffolk County District Attorney Raymond Tierney said in the office’s announcement, according to TBR News Media.
Materassi pleaded guilty to Grand Larceny in the Third Degree before Supreme Court Justice John B. Collins. Under the plea, he must make full restitution of $30,000 or face a 1-to-3-year prison sentence if he fails to pay.
Broader escrow trouble in multiple boroughs
The Suffolk case is only part of Materassi’s legal problems. In January, Nassau County prosecutors announced that they had charged him with withholding more than $133,000 in down payments from separate transactions in the Bronx, Queens and Suffolk, according to a press release from the Nassau County District Attorney’s Office.
That office says bank records show client funds were deposited into accounts for Materassi Legal P.C., registered at 55 Northern Boulevard in Great Neck, and that the firm’s trust account was later closed with a negative balance.
Materassi, who lists a Florida address, is represented by attorney Christopher Gioe, according to reporting by the Long Island Press. Suffolk prosecutors say the case was brought by the office’s Public Corruption Bureau.
Restitution deadline and what victims can do
Local reporting notes that, under the plea agreement, Materassi must repay the $30,000 in restitution or face a 1-to-3-year term in state prison if he does not, per Patch. The Nassau County District Attorney’s Office says anyone who believes they were victimized by Materassi is asked to contact its Criminal Complaint Unit at 516-571-3505.
The case lands amid a broader wave of alleged escrow thefts on Long Island and in New York City, ranging from six-figure complaints to multi-million-dollar schemes prosecuted by county district attorneys. Local coverage of related prosecutions is available from Daily Voice. For now, the Suffolk plea resolves one criminal count, while other civil and criminal actions tied to earlier complaints remain active.
