By Julie Shapiro
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
LOWER MANHATTAN — A former crane supervisor at the Deutsche Bank building allegedly cheated the federal government out of thousands of dollars by filing false disability claims, prosecutors said Monday.
Bruce Greenberg, 58, a Staten Island resident, was arrested Monday on charges that he fraudulently collected over $138,000 in disability benefits while he was also making hundreds of thousands of dollars overseeing a crane at the Deutsche site, prosecutors said.
"This defendant scammed taxpayers out of tens of thousands of dollars at a time when most people are struggling to make ends meet, and many are just looking for honest work," Staten Island District Attorney Daniel Donovan said in a statement.
Greenberg allegedly told the Social Security Administration that he had a lung disease that prevented him from working, even though he held the Deutsche Bank job from January 2004 to December 2008, prosecutors said.
The alleged fraud came to light during the investigation into the August 2007 blaze at the building, in which two firefighters were killed. Greenberg's case is unrelated to the fire and the manslaughter trial of three other construction supervisors at the site, which is now underway.
Greenberg and his wife Angela Greenberg, 56, were also charged with failing to pay over $30,000 in state income taxes in 2006 and 2007, prosecutors said.
Both Bruce and Angela Greenberg pleaded not guilty during their indictment on grand larceny and other charges in Stapleton Criminal Court Monday afternoon. Their lawyer could not immediately be reached for comment.
