Metro

Accused CityTime scammers ‘treated city like ATM machine’

The accused mastermind behind the massive CityTime payroll scam and his two trusted accomplices made out like bandits on the taxpayers’ dime, prosecutors told a Manhattan federal jury on Tuesday in closing statements at the high-profile trial.

“Each one of these three men made a fortune,” said Assistant US Attorney Andrew Goldstein, referring to CityTime kingpin Mark Mazer and co-defendants Gerard Denault and Dimitry Aronshtein. “They treated the city like their own giant ATM machine.”

Mazer headed the program to modernize the city’s payroll. Denault was program manager for the system’s primary contractor Science Applications International Corporation. Aronshtin is Mazer’s uncle and was a subcontractor for CityTime.

The government alleges Mazer pocketed $30 million through the kickback scheme while Denault made $9 million and Aronshtin $5 million.

“It was bribery the old fashioned way. Envelopes containing thousands of dollars handed on street corners, massage parlors.” Goldstein said.

“They laundered money in every way possible.”

The defendants’ lawyers will give their closing arguments to jurors Wednesday.

SAIC last year paid the city $500 million to avoid prosecution for profiting from the scandal, in which the cost of a new, high-tech municipal payroll system ballooned from $63 million to more than $600 million.