Reported by Holly Barker

A New York lawyer admitted Monday to money laundering and orchestrating an $18.8 million Ponzi scheme using his Forest Hills-based law firms, Wisnicki & Associates LLP and Wisnicki Neuhauser LLP.

Robert Wisnicki, who was indicted along with seven others in January 2022, pleaded guilty in the US District Court for Southern District of New York to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

On the first count, Wisnicki admitted that he used his law firms to launder money generated by a criminal conspiracy to defraud insurers—and then lied to both prosecutors and the grand jury about it.

The fraud involved a network of medical, acupuncture, and chiropractic practices—the “Gulkarov Conspiracy,” as prosecutors called it—that routinely submitted false claims to automobile insurance companies.

Wisnicki agreed to launder the profits from the scheme by depositing checks from the from the clinics into one of his firm trust accounts, and then arranging to use the funds to buy real estate for the organization’s leaders.

Read full report: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/white-collar-and-criminal-law/new-york-lawyer-pleads-guilty-to-ponzi-scheme-money-laundering