Long Island Businessmen Plead Guilty to Hoarding and Price-Gouging of Scarce Personal Protective Equipment

Early Wednesday, at the federal courthouse in Central Islip, Allen Goldmeirer and his brother Steven Goldmeier, owners of a toy company called Millennium Products Group (MPG), pleaded guilty to hoarding personal protective equipment (“PPE”) amid the Covid-19 pandemic and price-gouging customers that purchased three-ply surgical masks from them in violation of the Defense Production Act of 1950. The proceeding took place before United States Magistrate Judge James M. Wicks.

Jacquelyn M. Kasulis, Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and Michael J. Driscoll, Assistant Director-in-Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Office (FBI), announced the guilty pleas.

“The defendants selfishly sought to make millions of dollars in profits during an unprecedented public health crisis by hoarding and selling at exorbitant prices personal protective equipment that was desperately needed by the State of Oklahoma to protect the public health and safety, and save lives,” stated Acting United States Attorney Kasulis.  “This Office will continue to do everything in its power to enforce the Defense Production Act and ensure that opportunists like the defendants are held accountable for their indiscriminate acts of greed.”  Ms. Kasulis also expressed her appreciation to the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey and the Justice Department’s Covid-19 Hoarding and Price Gouging Task Force for their assistance with the case.

“During the height of the pandemic, cases in which people sought to capitalize on the situation at the expense of others were, unfortunately, an all-too-common occurrence. More than a year later, the FBI continues to work to identify and hold accountable any company, individual, or entity whose intention it was to do so. The Goldmeirer brothers pleaded guilty today for their role in a price-gouging scheme, and they’ll now await sentencing for their crimes,” stated FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Driscoll.

On March 18, 2020, in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Defense Production Act was invoked making it illegal to acquire medical supplies and devices designated by the Secretary of Health and Human Services as scarce in order to hoard them or sell them for excessive prices.

According to statements in court Wednesday, in March and April 2020, the defendants used their toy company, MPG, to obtain millions of three-ply surgical masks from China for between approximately $0.18 and $0.60 per mask.  Almost immediately thereafter, the defendants sold 1,227,500 of these masks to the State of Oklahoma, among others, at a price of $1.65 per mask – a markup of over 900% in many cases.

Pursuant to their agreement with the government, the defendants will pay $1 million in restitution to the State of Oklahoma prior to sentencing in this matter.  In addition, the defendants face up to one year in jail and a maximum fine of $10,000.

For more information on the Department’s response to the pandemic, please visit https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus

Anyone with information about allegations of attempted fraud involving Covid-19 can report it by calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud (NCDF) Hotline at 866-720-5721 or via the NCDF Web Complaint Form at: https://www.justice.gov/disaster-fraud/ncdf-disaster-complaint-form.

The government’s case is being handled by the Office’s Long Island Criminal Division, with assistance from the Justice Department’s Covid-19 Hoarding and Price-Gouging Task Force.  Assistant United States Attorney Megan E. Farrell is in charge of the prosecution.