Date Posted:07:10:29 07/21/06 Fri Author: Uncle Sam Subject: Isn't this ironic
This is the dramatic moment a mobbed-up executive for the Cipriani restaurant empire was carried out of court - just as prosecutors were charging him with using a heart condition to pocket $1.5 million in fake disability claims.
Dennis Pappas, 59, a $159,000-a-year vice president for Cipriani USA - which runs the Rainbow Room, among other top restaurants - popped pills, clutched his chest and was hauled on a stretcher from 1 Hogan Place yesterday, as a Daily News photographer snapped away.
A one-time lawyer who did prison time for advising the Colombo crime family, Pappas was rushed by ambulance to New York Downtown Hospital, where he was admitted.
Inside state Supreme Court, prosecutors were unsealing an indictment charging Pappas with using his heart woes to claim 100% disability, even while he was overseeing seven Cipriani-owned restaurants.
"He had a heart condition but not enough to prevent him from working full-time," said District Attorney Robert Morgenthau.
Pappas, who once claimed the FBI recruited him to spy on Iranian terror suspects, faces up to 25 years in prison on grand larceny and fraud counts.
He allegedly ripped off three insurance companies by filing bogus disability claims and also allegedly bilked Social Security to the tune of $90,000.
"Mr. Pappas asserts his innocence and looks forward to his day in court," said his lawyer Steven Cohen.
No one is doubting Pappas has a bad ticker - he suffered a heart attack when he was 28 and has had two bypass operations.
He once told The News that he blew big bucks on a lavish Sweet 16 party for his daughter because he feared he wouldn't live to dance at her wedding.
"It's always in the back of my mind," he said in a 1996 interview.
Pappas was sentenced in 1998 to four years in prison on racketeering and money-laundering charges and ordered to pay $1.75 million in fines and restitution. Prosecutors said he never paid up.
He got out of jail and mysteriously landed the plum top job with Cipriani, the legendary restaurant company that runs the Rainbow Room, Harry Cipriani on Fifth Ave. and Cipriani 42nd Street near Grand Central Terminal.
Along with his hefty salary, Pappas was given use of a $5,750-a-month apartment in Chelsea and a Humvee to drive.
Prosecutors don't know whether anyone at Cipriani knew about the insurance payments or of Pappas' criminal background.
The company's name has come up at several high-profile mob trials and a Gambino mobster recently testified that boss Giuseppe Cipriani tried to get his help to take care of a strike at the Rainbow Room.
Giuseppe Cipriani was out of the country and couldn't be reached. Stanley Arkin, a lawyer for Cipriani, had no comment.
