Window Cleaning Vice President Gets 10 Years

PITTSBURGH — A former executive of a western Pennsylvania window company has been sentenced to nine years in federal prison for unemployment compensation fraud, and other rip-offs. Forty-six-year-old Lacy Tilley, of Richland Township, was sentenced Friday after telling a federal judge in Pittsburgh his life story, including a past cocaine conviction and an 87-month prison sentence he's currently serving for gun possession as a felon. Friday's sentence will run concurrent to the gun term, meaning he'll be in prison until 2020, minus good time. Tilley ripped off the state unemployment system by having his girlfriend and several other associates illegally collect $39,000 in benefits while they still had jobs. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says Tilley also stole $305,000 from Penn Window Co. while its vice president, and cheated a business landlord out of $123,000 in a bid-rigging scheme.

Richland man given 9-year sentence for unemployment fraud: Typically, when defendants are asked to speak at their sentencing hearings, they apologize quickly and then stop talking. Lacy Tilley, 46, of Richland, decided instead today to tell his life story before U.S. District Judge Joy Flowers Conti sentenced him to nine years and two months in prison for ripping off his employer, clients, employees and the state unemployment compensation system.

Mr. Tilley, formerly vice president of Penn Window Co., is "a person who has been blessed with many attributes that would've made you quite successful if you'd focused on doing things in a proper manner," said Judge Conti. "You have a drive within you to succeed, but you've trampled over a lot of people whose lives are devastated."

Those people include his girlfriend and several ex-associates, who were convinced by him to collect unemployment while working, defrauding the state of $39,387 and as a result being indicted individually; Coraopolis-based Penn Window, from which he took $305,517; and the owners of a Cleveland office building who incurred losses of $123,000 when he arranged to have a bid rigged in favor of one of his companies.

Mr. Tilley told the judge that as a young man he was a Marine, who took a bad conduct discharge and got off to a rough start on civilian life with a job as a bouncer at a bar. "I was a drunken ex-Marine, and I sold coke," he said. He did time for cocaine, got out, and spent 15 years working hard, primarily for Penn Window. He worked so hard, he lost two wives, and drifted into and out of drug abuse. "Cocaine kept me awake, and I could work late hours," he said. "I [had] 80 employees, I've got four offices, 14 trucks," and logistical headaches, he said.

Then he met the love of his life, Claudelle McMahill. He was good to her, but roped her into his schemes, too, convincing her, and others, to cheat the unemployment system. Concocting that scheme, he said, "had to be the dumbest moment of my life." Ms. McMahill was sentenced to 20 months in prison for her role in his crimes. "I took advantage of people in business," he continued, admitting to ripping off One Cleveland Center through bid-rigging. "What did I gain? ... I lived high on the hog for several years."

He said he has suffered enough, even missing his mother's death and losing Ms. McMahill, and should be allowed to "get out there and pay these [victims of his crimes] back" by working for a living. "I haven't seen an iota of remorse from Mr. Tilley, and I've been dealing with him for five years now," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Brendan T. Conway. Mr. Tilley was first indicted in 2006, and has spent much of the time since pointing fingers at others. He also was caught with guns, which is illegal for a felon, and in 2008 was sentenced to seven years and three months in prison for that.

His nine-year sentence today, for 34 counts of wire fraud, money laundering, mail fraud and conspiracy, will run concurrently with the remainder of the gun sentence, meaning he can expect to get out by 2020. He must also join some of his co-conspirators in paying restitution, which totals around $507,000.

 Richland man sentenced to 9 years, 2 months in prison for fraud: A Richland man’s marathon attempt to prove he shouldn’t spend additional time in prison ended today when a federal judge sentenced him to nine years and two months in prison on three fraud cases. Lacey Tilley, 46, had argued in court documents that his sentence should run concurrent with — and end at the same time as — the sentence he’s already serving on a firearm charge. Tilley has been in Allegheny County since July 2007 after he was arrested in Florida for skipping bail on the fraud and firearm charges.

U.S. District Judge Joy Flowers Conti agreed to make the fraud sentence run concurrent with the firearms sentence but the nine years and two months is more time then he has left to serve for his December 2007 jury conviction of being a felon in possession of firearm. In the first fraud case, a federal jury in November 2008 convicted Tilley of buying a company that provides janitorial services and telling his employees to file fraudulent unemployment claims. He then included those unemployment benefits as part of their salaries. The jury convicted him on one count of conspiracy and 31 counts of mail fraud.

In the other two fraud cases, Tilley pleaded guilty in 2009 to one count of mail fraud for embezzling more than $300,000 from his former employer, Penn Window Cleaning Company, and one count of wire fraud connected to submitting false loan documents to obtain a mortgage. Assistant U.S. Attorney Brendan Conway said the year and nine months spent on hearings and motions between Tilley’s guilty plea and sentencing may be a record for the Western District of Pennsylvania. Conway confirmed the judge’s order means that the time Tilley already has served won’t be credited to his fraud sentence. Conti also sentenced Tilley to three years of probation.