Press Release  Attorney General's Office Secures Guilty Plea From West Springfield Man For Defrauding Hampden County Board Of Retirement

WEST SPRINGFIELD — The Attorney General’s Office (AGO) today announced that Robert Dombek, 53, of West Springfield pleaded guilty to the charges of Perjury and Larceny over $1,200 in Hampden Superior Court and was sentenced to 2.5 years in the House of Corrections (with one year to be served and the remaining 1.5 years suspended for two years) for his perjurious statement and two years in the House of Corrections (suspended for two years) for stealing $27,111 from the Hampden County Retirement Board (HCRB). Dombek will be on probation during the two-year period the unserved portions of his sentences are deferred.

Dombek was also ordered to submit to a mental health evaluation and counseling, pay $27,111 in restitution, and abstain from working with the elderly for the two-year period of his probation.

Dombek was tasked with caring for Norman Hannon, a former public pensioner who received monthly pension payments from the HCRB prior to his death in 2019. According to pension rules and the full retirement benefit option Hannon selected when he retired, Hannon’s pension offered no survivor benefit and should have expired upon his death. Soon after his death, the HCRB stopped paying Hannon’s pension payments because they correctly believed that he had died.

In November 2019, Dombek went to a notary and swore to an affidavit stating that Hannon was still living. Dombek hand delivered that false affidavit to HCRB’s office and asked the HCRB to resume direct-deposit payments into Hannon’s bank account. Dombek used Hannon’s bank account for his own purchases following Hannon’s death.

About a year after Dombek fraudulently induced the HCRB to resume its monthly benefit payments into the deceased pensioner’s bank account, the HCRB received a copy of Hannon’s death certificate, notifying them that Hannon was, in fact, dead. At that time, the HCRB again stopped paying Hannon’s monthly pension benefits.

Following Hannon’s death, the HCRB unwittingly made 13 pension benefit deposits totaling $27,111 into Hannon’s account, and Dombek took that money, which he had fraudulently induced the Board to pay, for himself.  In this way, Dombek stole $27,111 between November 2019 and September 2020. Dombek was indicted for perjury and larceny over $1,200 in December 2022.

The charges against Dombek were a result of a joint investigation by the AGO, the Office of the Inspector General, and the Massachusetts State Police.

This matter was handled by Assistant Attorney General Brad Tully of the AGO’s White Collar and Public Integrity Division. 

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