Gambling, A $17K Diamond: How Couple Spent Sandy Victims' $1.4M

TOMS RIVER, NJ — While Brick Township resident Bob Steimle was sleeping in a camper for two years, waiting for his Sandy-damaged home to be lifted and repaired, Jeffrey Colmyer was gambling hundreds of thousands of dollars, and Tiffany Cimino was buying expensive jewelry, including a $17,000 diamond ring.

On Tuesday, four years after Colmyer lifted Steimle's Mantoloking Road home and then disappeared, the contractor from Little Egg Harbor and his girlfriend, Cimino, pleaded guilty to theft charges, admitting they took more than $1.4 million from more than 20 people who had paid them and Colmyer's construction companies to repair their homes after Superstorm Sandy, state Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal announced Tuesday.

Colmyer, 42, and Cimino, 34, of pleaded guilty to charges of theft by failure to make required disposition of property received before Superior Court Judge Guy P. Ryan in Ocean County. Colmyer also pleaded guilty to second-degree money laundering on behalf the couple’s home improvement contracting companies, Rayne Construction Management Services, LLC (RCMS) and Colmyer & Sons, LLC, Grewal said.

As a condition of the plea agreement, Colmyer and Cimino must pay $695,402 in restitution to victims and $655,243 to the state as restitution for stolen Sandy relief funds, Grewal's office said. An additional $104,000 in restitution must be paid to five more victims who have been identified, bringing total restitution to $1,454,645, the attorney general's office said.

Colmyer also must pay $56,472 to the state for back taxes that he failed to pay.

Under the terms of the plea agreement, Colmyer is expected to be sentenced to seven years in prison, and Cimino is expected to receive probation. Sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 7, the attorney general's office said.

Steimle was among the victims in Ocean and Monmouth counties who Colmyer and Cimino convinced to turn over thousands of dollars in advance of work, primarily in Sandy relief funds, but then used the money for personal expenses. Grewal's office said Colmyer gambled hundreds of thousands of dollars at seven Atlantic City casinos.

Steimle gave Colmyer $54,000, which was half of his award under the Reconstruction, Rehabilitation, Elevation, and Mitigation (RREM) grant program. Colmyer was supposed to lift and repair Steimle's Mantoloking Road home, which was flooded by 4 feet of water during Sandy. Instead, Colmyer lifted the home and disappeared.

It led to a photo Steimle posted in the summer of 2016 that made the rounds on social media, showing messages he'd spraypainted on the beams under his home: "Welcome to my nightmare at the Shore" and "Gov. Christie ask me about RREM." Colmyer and Cimino were arrested a month after a Patch report on Steimle's plight. (RELATED: In Ocean County Man's Sandy Rebuilding Nightmare, Builder Lends A Helping Hand)

On Tuesday, Steimle said the arrest and subsquent indictment of the couple helped finally clear the way for his home reconstruction to go forward. The work was finally completed in April 2017, he said.

"That's good. He put me through hell," Steimle said Tuesday when told of Colmyer's guilty plea. "He just destroyed me."

"Everything should have gone so smoothly" when he was trying to rebuild after Sandy, but Colmyer's fraud turned his life upside down. He and his adult son lived in a camper for months, and he had to fight with RREM repeatedly over lost paperwork.

"I'm so glad it's done and over with," Steimle said.

"Colmyer and Cimino heartlessly preyed on Sandy victims whose homes had been destroyed, stealing the relief funds that were the lifeline these victims needed to rebuild in the aftermath of the historic storm," Grewal said. "By sending Colmyer to prison, we deliver a strong deterrent message that anyone willing to sink so low as to steal disaster relief money from victims will face a stern reckoning."

"The depth of greed and ruthless opportunism exhibited by this couple is hard to fathom," said Veronica Allende, director of the Division of Criminal Justice. "I commend all of the federal, state and local partners who worked with us to ensure that this couple will face justice for their crimes, which caused more grief and hardship for victims who were among those hardest hit by Superstorm Sandy."

Most of the funds that were stolen came from the RREM Program, a Sandy relief program administered by the state Department of Community Affairs and funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The RREM Program was the state’s largest Sandy housing recovery program and provided grants to impacted homeowners to cover rebuilding costs up to $150,000 that were not covered by insurance, other federal relief funds, or other sources.

The case was investigated by Detective Michael Arduini, Detective Jordan Thompson, Deputy Attorney General Nicodemo and former Analyst Alison Callery of the Division of Criminal Justice Financial & Computer Crimes Bureau, under the supervision of Lt. David Nolan, Deputy Bureau Chief Mark Kurzawa and former Bureau Chief Michael A. Monahan. They worked with Special Agents from the HUD Office of Inspector General. Deputy Attorney General Derek Miller and Civil Investigator Debra Maiorano handled the state’s forfeiture action.

Grewal thanked the Department of Community Affairs and the Division of Taxation Office of Criminal Investigation, HUD-OIG, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General, and the Little Egg Harbor Twp. Police Department for their assistance in the investigation. Special Agent Kyle Mullane investigated for the Division of Taxation.

Attorney General Grewal also commended the Division of Consumer Affairs for its investigation, lawsuit and cooperation. Investigators Joseph Iasso and Brittany Kieran investigated for the Division of Consumer Affairs Office of Consumer Protection. The lawsuit was handled by Deputy Attorney General Cathleen O’Donnell of the Consumer Fraud Prosecution Section in the Division of Law.

Jeffrey Colmyer and Tiffany Cimino photos via NJ State Attorney General's Office