TOMS RIVER—Two contractors have admitted to bilking Central Jersey homeowners out of hundreds of thousands of dollars that they paid to have damage from Superstorm Sandy repaired.

John Bishop, 57, of Celebration, Florida and Paul Rueda, 50, of San Diego, Texas pleaded guilty before Judge Lisa A. Puglisi in Ocean County Superior Court to one count of theft by failure to make required disposition, Bishop on May 6 and Rueda on Monday. The contractors cheated homeowners in Middlesex, Monmouth and Ocean counties out of the repair money between October 2014 and May 2017, authorities said.

Bishop agreed to pay $178,425 in restitution to the victims; Rueda, $542,800.

The prosecutor’s office will be seeking a four-year prison term against Bishop and a five-year term against Rueda at their sentencings scheduled for July 15 as part of the men’s plea bargains, Ocean County Prosecutor Bradley D. Billhimer said in a prepared statement.

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Bishop and Rueda started John Paul Building, LLC, in November 2012 and signed contracts with six homeowners who paid more than $350,00 to have damage from the superstorm repaired.

The homeowners got little if any work in return and the company folded without Bishop and Rueda returning any of the funds, the prosecutor said.

After that, between July 2016 and May 2017, four homeowners signed contracts with Rueda through his new business PKR Construction and paid $363,575 to have him fix damage to their homes from the storm.

Some work was done on the four homes, but Rueda didn’t complete the jobs and eventually used the victims’ money for his own benefit, Billhimer said.

Ken Serrano covers crime, breaking news, investigations and local issues. Reach him at [email protected].

Source: Asbury Park

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