A pizzeria restaurateur was sentenced Tuesday to a month in prison for his role in filing false federal tax return information.
U.S. District Judge Victor A. Bolden imposed the sentence on Steven Cioffi, 35, of Trumbull. After Cioffi serves the 30 days in prison, he will be on supervised release for one year.
Cioffi is half-owner of Nepperhan Restaurants Group Inc., which includes ReNapoli Pizza in Old Greenwich, and Pinocchio Pizza in Pound Ridge, New York. He also owns 25% of Odell Pizza Inc., which does business as Amore Cucina and Bar in Stamford.
His longtime business partner and co-defendant, Bruno DiFabio, owns the remaining interest in these restaurants and other pizzerias.
Cioffi pleaded guilty in September 2018 to one count of aiding and assisting in the filing of a false tax return. He is currently free on $40,000 bond and must report to the Federal Bureau of Prisons Aug. 2.
His defense attorney, New York-based David Colgan, had asked for a sentence of probation, asserting that his client’s ability to continue working at his restaurants would put him in a “better position to make restitution payments to the court.”
Prosecutors indicated Cioffi’s conduct caused the IRS to lose $122,178 for the 2013 through 2015 tax years. Bolden ordered Cioffi to make full restitution.
“Mr. Cioffi continues in his efforts to distance himself entirely from his co-defendant, Bruno DiFabio,” Colgan noted, in a memorandum to the court.
According to Colgan, his client is working to dissolve any business partnership with DiFabio in the restaurants.
The U.S. Attorney’s office indicated that Cioffi and DiFabio regularly removed cash from their cash registers instead of depositing the money into their restaurants’ bank account.
An outside bookkeeper and accountant used bank records to determine their businesses’ gross receipts. Therefore, income was not being reported to the IRS, prosecutors said. They also paid for some employees’ salaries and business expenses in cash, or “off the books.”
DiFabio pleaded guilty in 2018 to one count of conspiracy to file false income tax returns and payroll tax returns and admitted he caused the IRS to lose $816,954, the U.S. Attorney’s office said.
In January of this year, James Guerra, the businesses’ accountant, pleaded guilty to one count of willful failure to collect and pay over withholding taxes. In June 2019, Idalecia Lopes Santos, the businesses’ bookkeeper, pleaded guilty to one count of tax evasion.
DiFabio and Guerra await sentencing, while Lopes Santos was sentenced in March of this year to three years of probation.
Contact Michelle Tuccitto Sullo at msullo@newhavenbiz.com.
