Queens Defenders co-founder sentenced to 43 months

BROOKLYN (CN) — The co-founder of a New York City legal services group for defendants who can’t afford an attorney was sentenced to 43 months in prison Tuesday after admitting she and her ex-husband siphoned tens of thousands of dollars from the organization to pay for vacations, expensive dinners and a penthouse apartment — a scandal that preceded the legal group’s collapse.Lori Zeno, 66, helped found Queens Defenders three decades ago. While serving as the group’s executive director from 2018 to January 2025, prosecutors say she stole hundreds of thousands of dollars and used her position to secure no-show jobs for her ex-husband Rashad Ruhani’s friends and relatives, including his daughter. She and Ruhani were each charged with three counts of wire fraud and one count each of wire fraud conspiracy, theft of funds and money laundering conspiracy.“I have disappointed myself, my family, my friends, people who trusted me and even looked up to me. I still have not found the right words to say to them. But I can say that I am so very sorry for the choices I made, the actions I took and the consequences that came from those actions,” Zeno said in court, reading from a letter filed earlier Tuesday.Zeno pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Joseph Marutollo in February.Ruhani, 56, also pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 57 months in prison, the low end of his guidelines range, by U.S. District Judge Rachel Kovner, a Donald Trump appointee.“Mr. Ruhani wasn’t the person with the most power in this situation … but anybody would have known this was a wrong thing to do,” Kovner said.In addition to their prison sentences, Zeno and Ruhani, who both had family members in court Tuesday supporting them, must pay more than $650,000 in restitution to the Queens Defenders. Zeno owes more than $187,000 in forfeiture and Ruhani owes more than $102,000.The scandal directly led to the collapse of Queens Defenders, the group says. Last year, shortly after the indictment came down, Brooklyn Defender Services absorbed the Queens group’s core work, transferring staff and contracts to the neighboring borough organization.Queens Defenders lost $35 million in contracts to represent indigent clients, the group said in a sentencing filing, along with numerous state and city contracts that didn’t transfer over, “creating enormous service gaps for vulnerable New Yorkers.”“The defendant’s actions resulted in an institutional catastrophe that has inseparably associated the name ‘Queens Defenders’ with scandal,” the group wrote.Former employees also submitted impact statements described Zeno as a corrupt and vengeful boss who used intimidation to keep employees in check, accusing her of breaking labor laws and driving away talented attorneys by perpetuating a toxic culture.Ruhani was not the first love interest of Zeno’s who profited off the organization she ran, former employees said. Zeno previously hired a boyfriend who worked in construction to complete a massive renovation of a Queens Defenders office in Forest Hills by bypassing the bidding process required for nonprofits, according to Naira Grigoryan, a senior attorney at Brooklyn Defender Services of Queens.Grigoryan asked Kovner to sentence Zeno to 51 months in prison, saying “she is the furthest from deserving of leniency by the Court for the wrongdoing that she perpetuated in a place that helps to undo the wrongdoing that our clients so often face.”“This request goes against the very fiber of my professional identity since I spent my, almost 20 year, career asking the Court to do the opposite when advocating for my clients’ rights,” Grigoryan added.Prosecutors say Zeno and Ruhani were married in a “religious ceremony” in August 2024, though the marriage is not legally recognized. They also say Ruhani’s wife, who lives in Saudi Arabia, was among the no-show employees Zeno hired. Employees accused Zeno of hiring her own children for no-show jobs, too, all while making a salary that exceeded $400,000.In 2024, Zeno promoted Ruhani to manage Queens Defenders’ youth program and gave him a company credit card. Prosecutors say the couple used organization credit cards between June 2024 and January 2025 to buy luxury clothing, pay for Mercedes-Benz repairs and fund vacations, including their honeymoon in Bali.Zeno and Ruhani were reimbursed for rent on a penthouse apartment that Zeno claimed would house a homeless minor, while concealing that they were using it themselves. DoorDash deliveries and an 85-inch smart TV purchased with organization funds helped expose the arrangement.“Instead of upholding the law and serving those in need, the defendants greedily served themselves by spending those funds on luxury goods, lavish travel, and other personal indulgences," U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella Jr. said in a statement Tuesday.Prosecutors urged Kovner to sentence Zeno to 51 months in prison, the low end of the guidelines range, while Zeno sought a noncustodial sentence and placed the blame on Ruhani.Zeno first hired Ruhani, who had served decades in prison, to work in a Queens Defenders program where former offenders work with young offenders in the community. He was a client advocate earning $60,000 a year and “seemed a perfect addition to the Queens Defenders staff,” Zeno said in her sentencing memo.“However, it quickly became clear that Rashad Ruhani had his own personal agenda that went way beyond being [an] advocate for teenaged offenders,” Zeno wrote, describing Ruhani as emotionally manipulating her into diverting Queens Defenders funds to support his expensive tastes.Zeno, through her defense attorney Anthony Ricco, detailed traumatic childhood experiences, an abusive marriage that resulted in her raising children as a single parent and decades of alcoholism and mental health issues. Meeting Ruhani in late 2023 amid those circumstances led to a “downward spiral,” Zeno said. “Lori Zeno’s lifetime of commitment was manipulated, exploited, derailed and destroyed. Lori Zeno lost her will, and lost her way in life.”Over the past year, since her indictment was filed, Zeno said she’s attended individual and group therapy, and goes to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings on a daily basis.Zeno, who is out on bail, will self-surrender on Sept. 28. Ruhani remains in custody.Since its founding in 1996, Queens Defenders has helped more than 500,000 people with criminal, domestic violence, housing and other legal matters. The organization is funded primarily by the city and state, along with private grants, and receives some federal funding.Categories / Criminal, LawSubscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads