Settlement in Denenberg case?

Lawyer for former Senate hopeful says matter may be resolved soon

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An attorney for Dave Denenberg, a Nassau County legislator who gave up a campaign for State Senate last month after his former law firm accused him of defrauding a client of $2.3 million, said recently that the matter should “resolve quickly.”

The firm, Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, where Denenberg was formerly a partner and chairman of its intellectual property law group, alleged in a lawsuit that he billed a client, Systemax, Inc., for fictional work, defrauding the global technology company over eight years. DHC also alleged that Denenberg received hundreds of thousands of dollars in reimbursements from the firm for expenses he did not actually incur. The firm demanded that Denenberg repay $3.6 million — the entirety of his compensation from 2006 through June of this year — and referred its claims to the office of Loretta Lynch, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, for potential criminal prosecution.

The lawsuit spurred Denenberg, a Merrick Democrat, to drop out of the 8th State Senate District race, in which he was pitted against Michael Venditto, a county legislator and Massapequa Republican, the same day DHC filed it. But Jeffrey Gold, Denenberg’s lawyer, has indicated that a settlement may now be in the works.

At a Sept. 29 hearing in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, Judge Joan Kenney recommended that DHC and Denenberg settle the case, according to Gold. “The parties are taking that seriously,” he said.

No transcript of the hearing was made, according to the court reporters’ office. A representative of DHC did not return a call for comment.

Gold declined to comment on the substance of DHC’s allegations. “It’ll be addressed in legal papers if the matter does not resolve quickly, which I believe it will,” he said.

He did, however, follow the lead of his client and a local Democratic leader in describing DHC’s suit as politically motivated. Gold would not elaborate on why DHC might want to undermine Denenberg’s run for higher office, but he said the lawsuit was “unusually vitriolic.”

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