Former White Plains developer Michael P. D”™Alessio has petitioned bankruptcy court to liquidate 15 companies connected to failed real estate projects.
D”™Alessio declared $49.7 million in assets and $97.5 million in liabilities in Chapter 7 petitions filed from June 7 to June 12 in White Plains.
Twenty lawsuits, including several that allege fraud and misappropriation of funds, according to court records, are pending against D”™Alessio. The lawsuits were filed in Westchester, New York and Suffolk counties in New York, as well as in Vermont and in Newark and Atlantic City in New Jersey.
Additionally, three banks petitioned bankruptcy court in April to force him into Chapter 7 liquidation, claiming he owed more than $6.3 million.
In that case, D”™Alessio identified 115 companies registered at 12 Water St., White Plains, and he declared $23,350 in assets and $165 million in liabilities.
D”™Alessio has solicited investments for at least seven real estate projects in Manhattan, Scarsdale, Southampton and Westhampton.
He bought four Upper East Side townhouses, for example, and gutted or demolished them to build luxury condominiums. He promised investors returns of 10 to 16 percent a year, several complaints state, and personally guaranteed the loans.
He stopped making payments late last year.
“There was absolutely no fraud committed,” D”™Alessio said in an April email defending himself against investors”™ accusations. “Just a case of disgruntled seasoned real estate investors with big damaged egos.”
He filed his petitions in White Plains, but recently he asked the same court to reassign the banks”™ case to New York County. His lawyer, Sanford P. Rosen, said the White Plains business address has not been used since March.
The new business address is on East Tremont Avenue in the Bronx, care of D”™Alessio”™s property management company, Aspen Management Group LLC.
D”™Alessio moved from Westchester in September and now lives on East 66th Street, within five blocks of the townhouse projects.
Bankruptcy Judge Cecelia G. Morris denied the request to move the case.
