Former Buffalo employee gets year in prison for stealing from parking meters; among 4 charged
Posted October 17, 2014 12:40 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
BUFFALO, N.Y. – A former part-time city worker has been sentenced to a year in prison for stealing $69,000 from Buffalo parking meters.
Franklin Lopez is the fourth Parking Enforcement Department employee to be convicted and sentenced for keeping coins he collected from meters. He worked for the parking department from 2002 to 2011.
Last year, James Bagarozzo was sentenced to 30 months for stealing more than $200,000. Lawrence Charles received a six-month sentence for stealing more than $10,000 and Francis Tronolone received the same sentence for stealing $9,000.
All must also pay the money back.
U.S. Attorney William Hochul (HOH’-kuhl) says that since the 2011 arrests knocked the four men off the city payroll, parking revenues have gone up by more than $700,000.
The city now has mostly electronic meters.
