Swindled $21,000 from his oil company's customers
LOWELL, Mass. — A Chelmsford, Massachusetts, man who won $1 million from a Massachusetts State Lottery ticket in 2009 will serve at least 18 months behind bars after he admitted to swindling more than $21,000 from his home oil company's customers, according to Middlesex District Attorney Gerry Leone.
Michael Santaniello, 60, of Chelmsford, pleaded guilty in Lowell District Court last week to stealing money from more than a dozen of his clients, many of whom are elderly, by collecting deposits for service or repairs to home oil tanks and burners that he never completed, Leone said in a statement. Santaniello owns Mike's Oil Heat Service in Chelmsford.
"This defendant targeted seniors, many of whom had been his customers for years, and took advantage of them by taking deposits for work he never intended to perform and materials he never provided," Leone said in a statement.
The prosecutor said that a gambling addiction led Santaniello to cheat his customers. After Santaniello won $1 million in 2009, he won another $23,000 from the lottery over the next two years, Leone said.
Santaniello gets about $35,000 a year after taxes through 2029 from his $1 million lottery win.
"This case demonstrates how addiction, when left untreated, can lead a person to such despair and selfishness that they would manipulate and deceive vulnerable, trusting members of our community who deserve better," Leone's statement said, noting that a judge ordered Santaniello to also enroll in Gamblers Anonymous.
Santaniello pleaded guilty to several charges, including four counts of larceny over $250 from a person over 60 years of age; six counts of larceny over $250; larceny by check over $250; larceny over $250 by false pretenses; and failure to return leased personal property, according to the district attorney's office.
Santaniello was ordered to pay restitution to clients from Chelmsford, Billerica, Lexington, Burlington, Wilmington, Somerville, Bedford and Westford, Leone said.
What. A. Dumbass...
I guess gambling can be as big a problem as anything else if it gets a hold of ya as an addiction.
I think I have too much of a dread for losing to ever fall prey to that.
They say the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem and that's probably the hardest thing for an addict to do.
Heaven knows I'd admit my faults and flaws right away.
If I had any.
were here is you need us rdg,
Heating your home is expensive enough, and to add insult to injury, he took advantage of the elderly, more human garbage, throw away the key and keep his cell at a nice 60 degrees.
Wish yuh luck guys! :D
Couldn't have said it any better,myself.
Yeesh! There always seems to be some kind of negative story about people who win the lottery...talk about shady pasts! Better not buy a ticket unless you've got nothing to hide...it will all come out if you win,lol.
this piece of garbage as U put it ought to feel the effects of 1600 to 1800 degrees in a small oven
the sweet thing is he is being paid by an annuity, so cant shirk on his repayments of debts.
im not an ahole so i could never get into this sort of trouble.
18 month behind bars should be a good "treatment" for his illness?
Great point.
This rascal won another $23,000 after he won $1mil
Dang!! have good honest people who have not won even once!
It's hard to live or act like a millionaire when your million comes $35K yearly after taxes over 30 years.
. His payments are also only for 20 years.
A net $35K annuity + income from gambling per year isn't bad living; if a solo person using careful spending. However, if he won another $23K and continued stealing, perhaps he spent more than $23K to get that it! Or perhaps he simply enjoys being a stealing bully month-in-month-out, and living higher on the hog than his net income from work plus gambling provided him.
Greeds and addictions are deeply entrenched habits/mindsets. I've got my own couple of addictions (unhealthy foods and inactivity) that I will cease this year, one way or another.
LMAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO @ helpmewin!!
In reference to the article, addict or not, he's just plain evil and greedy and I'm glad he was caught. I despise people that rob others to feed their evil needs, especially elderly people. And to just know he's won the lottery twice already makes my butt wanna chew nails and spit rust.
He must have won the $1M by playing a lot. Problem is that he had got used to playing a lot and when time to stop came he didn't even realize it. $35,000 a year on top of a job that pays $25,000 a year is good income even in Mass with all the taxes. Sadly some people cannot be saved
Yeah, ever so often we read of some lowlife doing bad things.This guy was pulling this crap in a few neighbourhoods and probably got comfortable thinking he could get away with it. I don't give a rat's arse about his age, maybe 18 months will straighten his oit or not, in any event his pulling time.
What does he tell his cellmate who asks " Hey old Timer- what you in for?
Think he would be honest and say " screwing the elderly over "..by the way can l get an extra blanket, its cold in here.
The prosecutor is overly nice in saying that Michael Santaniello's cheating of his customers and especially the elderly was because of his gambling addiction. Santaniello's experience with cheating his customers appears to be much older than his winning the big one from the lottery.
Since Santaniello could not see himself someday, if he is lucky, in the shoes of the elderly that he cheated, and since Santaniello could not see his uncles, aunts, parents, and other senior members of his friend's families in the elderly that he cheated, Santaniello is most likely not a true human entity, but a cloaked evil spirit masquerading about on earth as a human being, and he was just going about, living out the demonic appointment that he had in his tenure of life on earth.
Hopefully, the Preachers will win him over during the next 18 months behind bars, and convince him, to do more for those that he had cheated, at least from the $35K that he still has coming to him, yearly from the Lottery.
I know a few persons who because of economic hardships keep their winter thermostats in the mid fifties during the day and even colder at night up here in the midwest.
I think that 60 degrees will be way too comfortable for Michael Santaniello, to trigger a lesson in respect for the elderly, and their struggles and for others for their hard earned monies.
How about knocking off 20 degrees from the 60 degrees and give him an extra blanket just enough to make him feel its about 45 degrees inside. He won't die from it alright, but he might learn from it.
Your right, with the toilet seat in a nice drafty area, he gets no socks either.
Its way too harsh to give the guy jail time instead of treatment. He could get BETTER and make restitution.
I think I just need to be held...
Give him the fancy treatment WHILE HE IS DOING THE JAIL TIME.That way he still gets punished if the treatment doesn't work!
Perhaps house arrest and in home care would do?
That might just be what he gets with the liberal judges that sit on the bench these days.Whatever happened to the "make the punishment fit the crime" line of thinking?
Sadly enough, we are not the America we used to be my friend.