GUILDERLAND — A Guilderland man, David A. Mazzeo, and his Schenectady partner in crime, Michael C. Caruso, were convicted on on Feb. 15 for defrauding investors and lending institutions.

A jury, after hearing over 30 witnesses during a two-week trial, returned a verdict in just three hours, finding both defendants guilty of all counts charged.

Each man was convicted of second-degree money laundering and of first-degree scheme to defraud, both felonies.

Mazzeo, 59, was also convicted of these additional felonies: three counts of third-degree grand larceny, fourth-degree grand larceny, securities fraud, first-degree offering a false instrument for filing, and fourth-degree criminal tax fraud.

When Mazzeo was arrested last spring, his lawyer, Francisco Calderon, told The Enterprise, “This isn’t some type of scam. Mr. Mazzeo is a businessman.”

However, during the trial, presided over by Judge Thomas A. Breslin in Albany County Supreme Court, evidence showed that Caruso, 62, opened a personal bank account in his name only so that Mazzeo could use the account while he was being investigated for other frauds to steal close to $150,000. Some of that money was used to pay off the restitution he owed from previous crimes.

Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s Office described, in a release, evidence at the trial unfolding this way:

Between July 2012 and September 2013, Mazzeo needed money to pay his criminal defense attorney and restitution to his victims and others threatening more charges.

He had been convicted in May 2012 in Fulton County of grand larceny and sentenced to five years of probation, which required him to pay restitution to his Fulton County victim.

In June 2012, Mazzeo was charged again, with stealing $25,000 in an investment scam, this time in Montgomery County. Caruso signed a $50,000 bail bond on behalf of Mazzeo.

Then, in August of that year, Mazzeo was indicted in Albany County, charged with stealing $150,000 in a real-estate investment scam and diverting the money to pay off earlier victimes.

In early 2013, Mazzeo pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in the Montgomery County case and paid $25,000 to his victim. In February that year, he was convicted of felony grand larceny on the Albany County indictment and sentenced in April to five years of probation, and also ordered to pay his victims $150,000.

At the same time, Caruso owned a failing business that made lockers for college teams, Prozone Lockers. By May 2012, evidence showed, Caruso faced eviction from his Amsterdam factory and needed help to stave off default from his three Montgomery County lenders.

On July 18, 2012, three weeks after Caruso bailed out Mazzeo on the fraud charges in Montgomery County, Caruso opened a bank account solely in his name at First Niagara Bank, giving Mazzeo exclusive authority over the account’s debit card. That allowed Mazzeo to get money from new investment victims while avoiding detection by authorities looking at him for his prior crimes.

After resolving his criminal cases by guilty pleas in 2013, Mazzeo opened an account in his own name. In Mazzeo’s new scam, he told investors he was close to securing deals in the coal or natural-gas industry and needed money just to finalize the deals.

With Caruso’s help, he got nearly $150,000 for the fake energy projects while they actually used the money personally by funneling it through Caruso’s account. Mazzeo’s lawyer was paid over $20,000 and earlier victims were paid over $30,000.

Caruso used the stolen money funnelled through the account to prop up his business while Mazzone made nearly $37,000 in cash withdrawals and personal expenditures in the Albany area for liquor, tobacco products, and items from Victoria’s Secret.

Also, evidence showed that, in exchange for using Caruso’s account, Mazzeo drafted and secured fake loan-commitment letters for Caruso that Caruso then gave to lenders who were threatening foreclosure on his business assets and his financial demise.

Further, trial evidence showed that Mazzone filed a false state income tax return in 2012, failing to report the money he’d stolen, and he did not file a 2013 return at all, evading over $4,000 on his ill-gotten gains.

Mazzeo is now serving a sentence of two-and-a-third to seven years in state prison for his prior fraud convictions. Caruso was taken to Albany County’s jail pending sentencing, which is scheduled for April 11.