U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Craig Carpenito announced his resignation Monday, effective Jan. 5 at at 11:59 p.m, three years to the date of his appointment.
During his tenure, Carpenito established the cybercrimes and opioids units and prosecuted a variety of high-profile criminal targets, including a Hudson County health official who accepted bribes for patient referrals, an accountant who embezzled nearly $1 million from her employer, a pharmacy owner who conspired to defraud the Internal Revenue Service, and a Burlington construction company that underpaid employees on public jobs.
He also helped Attorney General Gurbir Grewal and State Comptroller Kevin Walsh establish the New Jersey COVID-19 Fraud Task Force, a joint federal-state effort to investigate and prosecute misconduct arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, including unlawful hoarding of medical supplies, price gouging, charity scams, procurement fraud, insurance fraud, phishing schemes and false or misleading investment opportunities.
Outgoing U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Craig Carpenito – NJBIZ FILE PHOTO
By May, price gouging, the sale of fraudulent personal protective equipment, and phishing scams were prevalent. In some cases, Carpenito said, PPE had been marked up 700 percent. That’s the difference of a hospital system spending $2.6 million to purchase equipment to protect their workers compared to a fair price of $300,000.
Carpenito also noted in his public resignation letter that one of his early priorities in the U.S. Attorney’s office was to advance its eLitigation capabilities, bringing the public office up to speed with the electronic filing systems he grew accustomed to in private practice.
“I recognized during my time in private practice that the government had fallen far behind the pace of the private sector when it came to efficiently receiving, processing, and using electronic evidence. At my request, our Office became one of the first USAOs to participate in an EOUSA pilot program designed to revolutionize and modernize our eLitigation program,” Carpenito said.
The success of the program led to Daniel Shapiro, deputy chief of the Criminal Division, to be named as co-chair of a nationwide eLitigation initiative that followed in New Jersey’s footsteps.
In June, Carpenito was tapped by Attorney General William Barr, who also announced his resignation on Dec.14, to serve as acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York to replace Geoffrey Berman. However, Berman initially refused to step down, and later that month was replaced by his deputy Audrey Strauss.
Upon Carpenito’s departure, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Rachael Honig will serve as acting U.S. Attorney under the Vacancies Reform Act until a replacement is named. Honig joined the U.S. Attorney’s Office as an AUSA in 2003.
