Great Neck attorney charged with stealing more than $470,000

Joe Nikic

A Great Neck attorney was arrested Wednesday morning for stealing more than $470,000 from a Manhasset couple selling their home and taking out and falsely representing himself to take out a loan as a part owner of a corporation owned by his former mother-in-law, Acting Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas announced.

Daniel Spitalnic, 38, of Queens, faces charges, in two separate cases, of three counts of second-degree grand larceny, one count of second-degree criminal possession of a forged instrument, and one count of offering a false instrument for filing in the first-degree.

If convicted of the top count, Spitalnic faces up to 15 years in prison, the DA’s office said.

“This attorney allegedly enriched himself at the expense of his clients and mortgaged a property that belonged to his former mother-in-law’s corporation,” Singas said in a statement. “Stealing is wrong, but for an attorney to allegedly defraud a former family member and client is particularly troubling.”

Spitalnic, whose practice is located at 6 Grace Ave., was released on $30,000 bail and is due back in court tomorrow.

In March, Singas said, Spitalnic obtained a $300,000 loan by representing himself as part owner and officer of a business owned by his former mother in-law.

The loan was secured by a mortgage on a commercial property in Great Neck, the DA’s office said, and Spitalnic allegedly used the money for personal interests such as rent, travel, entertainment, food, and other miscellaneous expenses.

Spitalnic’s former mother-in-law discovered the suspicious activity when she tried to pay real estate taxes and found they had already been paid by a title company, according to the DA’s office.

She confronted the defendant, the DA’s office said, who gave her a Satisfaction of Mortgage document saying the loan had been satisfied.

The document, which was filed with the Nassau County Clerk’s office in May, was forged, according to the DA’s office.

In the second case, Spitalnic was representing a family that was selling their home.

After a buyer paid a $171,500 down payment for the home, the DA’s office said Spitalnic was supposed to hold that money in escrow pending the closing.

After the property’s closing on Sept. 8, the DA’s office said, the sellers never received the escrow money.

Efforts to reach Spitalnic’s law offices and his attorney, Andrew Stengel, were unavailing.

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