By Mike Donoghue THE RUTLAND HERALD
BURLINGTON — A Windsor County man, who admitted he stole more than $50,000 from the Social Security Administration that was intended for his dead father, was placed on federal probation on Thursday for three years.
John O’Hara Jr., 43, of White River Junction, pocketed the monthly checks from February 2018, when his father died, to about October 2020, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
U.S. District Court Judge Christina Reiss ordered O’Hara to pay $51,346 in restitution to SSA. She said he would be assessed 10% of his gross pay each month. She agreed to waive adding any interest to the money owed.
O’Hara, who worked as loss prevention specialist with Best Buy for 13 years, admitted to defrauding Social Security Administration when he was confronted the second time by federal agents, Assistant U.S. Attorney Gregory Waples said. There was doubt cast on the first version O’Hara provided, he said.
O’Hara later worked for Citizen’s Bank for three years and became a machine operator for Hypertherm and next moved into human resources, but the company fired him when he reported his arrest, court records show.
Defense lawyer David Silver, of Bennington, maintained home confinement wasn’t needed. He said the focus should be on getting to work on the restitution. Silver noted that after O’Hara lost his job his income went from $80,000 to $30,000 when he found new employment.
Silver said he hoped O’Hara’s income would grow in the coming years and that his old employer had indicated it might rehire him.
O’Hara said he was sorry for his decisions and said he takes full responsibility.
O’Hara is well known in the Windsor County area due to his charitable work and serving as an assistant coach for the American Legion baseball team. He also was a coach in the Hartford recreational program.
He also has volunteered at the Listen Center thrift store in White River Junction.
O’Hara, the son, never notified Social Security of his father’s death and SSA continued to make benefit payments to an account for O’Hara, the father. O’Hara, the son, fraudulently converted those unauthorized payments to his own use by transferring the money to an account he controlled in North Carolina, and then accessing those funds from Vermont for personal purposes, the prosecution said.
The federal sentencing guidelines, which are advisory, had suggested a penalty between six and 12 months. Both sides said they thought probation was appropriate in this case, although Waples suggested maybe a few months of home confinement.
Reiss said she questioned whether home confinement would be appropriate. She said it appears the case was fully out of character for O’Hara.
“You have been a stand-up guy your entire life,” Reiss said during the hearing.
O’Hara received a few letters of support, including from a friend that works as a prosecutor in Joppa, Maryland, and a retired Vermont law enforcement officer who served on several boards for the town of Hartford.
The maximum penalty was up to 10 years in prison, up to three years supervised release and up to a $250,000 fine.
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