A lawyer for convicted “Banana King” bad boy Thomas Hoey wants to block a jury from hearing evidence of his hard-partying ways, arguing that it’s in no way relevant to his ongoing embezzlement case, new court papers say.
Hoey – who is currently locked up for beating up his girlfriend and supplying cocaine that caused another woman to overdose – is awaiting trial in Manhattan federal court on charges he stole nearly $1 million in pension benefits from workers at his Long Island Banana Company.
The 47-year-old is currently serving more than 12 years for his role in the 2009 cocaine-fueled death of Kimberly Calo during a wild three-way romp.
That’s on top of another 1 1/3- to 4-year-sentence he got for beating up girlfriend Alison Bretherick in 2012.
Earlier this month, prosecutors told Hoey’s attorney Dominic Amorosa that they want to introduce proof at trial of “the defendant’s use of cash to purchase bulk quantities of cocaine and for entertainment purposes, including dinners, bar tabs, gentlemen’s establishments and prostitutes.”
But Amorosa argues there’s no allegation that the cash Hoey is accused of stealing was used to buy drugs.
“On the contrary, the indictment alleges that all the embezzled money went to pay obligations of Long Island Banana including personal expenses of the Defendant placed on corporate credit cards,” Amorosa wrote in papers filed last Thursday.
“It is all prejudice,” he added.
Amorosa also argued that a June 2009 embezzlement transaction that Hoey is charged with exceeds the statute of limitations.
Prosecutors say in filings that Hoey “took money from his employees’ pension plan to fund – or at least allow him to continue funding – his own extravagant personal lifestyle.”
Hoey allegedly dipped into the fund at his now-bankrupt banana firm between 2009 and 2012, and used more than $800,000 of it to fund a lavish lifestyle that included trips to Aruba, London and Paris and additional money to cover his company’s losses, the indictment says.
The embezzlement trial is slated to begin March 14, according to court records.