Hurricane Sandy contractor sentenced to 4 years for stealing $2.5M in recovery funds

Alexander Almaraz took payments from 20-plus storm victims to lift and rebuild their flooded homes, then spent the money on luxury cars and land in Missouri

A Freeport contractor who bilked more than 20 Hurricane Sandy victims out of their storm-recovery money was sentenced Wednesday to four years in federal prison.

Alexander Almaraz, 55, owner of Design Concepts Group LLC, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Joan Azrack in Central Islip to 48 months on a wire fraud conspiracy charge. He had pleaded guilty in September 2024.

Almaraz’s customers had all qualified for funding through the New York Rising program, set up after Sandy struck Long Island’s coast on Oct. 29, 2012. The contracts called for him to lift the flood-damaged homes onto temporary supports, replace their foundations, then lower the houses back down and reconnect them.

Between October 2015 and June 2019, at least 20 homeowners hired Almaraz and paid him about $2.5 million, prosecutors said. Many moved out and paid him rent to live elsewhere while they waited for the work to be finished.

Instead, prosecutors said, Almaraz let the projects sit and spent the money on credit card bills; expensive cars including a Lamborghini, a Porsche and a Jaguar; and land he bought in Kansas City, Missouri.

The scheme caused more than $1.5 million in losses to the state program and the victims.

Almaraz had since moved to San Antonio. Restitution to his victims will be determined at a later date, authorities said.

_{Top: Freeport residents on Grant Street with the piles of possessions that were ruined by the floods of Hurricane Sandy in 2012 (AP Photo/Kathy Kmonicek).}