Long Island Man Gets 5 Years In Prison For Embezzling Millions

VALLEY STREAM, NY — The CFO of a Nassau County real estate company was sentenced today to five years in prison for embezzling millions of dollars from his company.

Kwesi Bovell, 38, of Valley Stream, was sentenced to 60 months in prison and has to pay restitution of $3.45 million from embezzling from his employer, The Mulholland Group, a Manhasset-based realty company.

Bovell pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in 2019.

“To fund a lifestyle of extravagance and opulence, the defendant plundered his employer’s company from the time he was hired until his fraud was discovered three years later, and with today’s sentence, he is punished for his avarice and betrayal,” said Acting United States Attorney Jacquelyn Kasulis.

According to Kasulis, Bovell was hired as the chief financial officer of Mulholland in 2015. Shortly after, he began to embezzle money from the company. As CFO, he had siganture authority over numerous bank accounts of Mulholland and its subsidiaries. Over three years, Bovell transfered more than $3.5 million from Mulholland to a company he controlled called Southgate Holdings.

Bovell spent most of the money on luxury purchases for himself and others, including a $66,000 ring; $500,000 to a woman with whom he was in a relationship; an additional $500,000 into a laundromat business operated, in part, by that woman; approximately $90,000 to another woman for whom he rented an apartment in Manhattan; $722,000 on a failed gym, Evolution Fitness, in Suffolk County; as well as purchases at Brooks Brothers, Cartier, Chanel and Gucci.

According to Mulholland, at least $1.5 million remains unaccounted for.