Prosecutor: Woman ran $50,000 scam as East End 'widow'

When Nydia Vega showed up one day in May 2009 at Eastern Harley-Davidson in Riverhead, she was driving a yellow Porsche. Another day, the seemingly well-heeled Hamptons socialite drove a Maserati, salesman Mike Chornoma recalled Thursday.

Vega bought a black 2009 Softail Deluxe motorcycle, saying she planned to give it to a man doing work at her Westhampton rental home, Chornoma said. She paid $18,900, using a check bearing the name of a man she said was her recently deceased husband, Chornoma said.

"The way she was, she seemed very wealthy, it didn't seem out of place," Chornoma said in an interview. "If you saw her come in with two $100,000-plus cars, it wouldn't seem that crazy."

That is, not until a few days later - when the check bounced. That's when Chornoma learned he had become the latest of what Suffolk County prosecutors say is a long line of people that Vega scammed.

Vega, 63, whose record of forgery and grand larceny convictions dates to 1977, eluded Suffolk authorities for a year after passing about $50,000 in bad checks to buy the motorcycle, patio furniture and lingerie while posing as a rich East End widow in summer 2009, a Suffolk County prosecutor said Thursday.

She was caught when Monmouth County, N.J., authorities arrested her last month for allegedly failing to pay for a meal, Suffolk prosecutors said.

In addition to the motorcycle, Vega used bad checks to buy $27,000 worth of patio furniture from Hildreth's Patio Store in Southampton and $2,463.18 in lingerie from Sweet Anezka's Lingerie in Westhampton Beach, the district attorney's office said.

SEE PHOTOSHangin' in the Hamptons: August 2010

"You see her, she looks like a respectable person," said Anezka Jureckova, who said Vega, a longtime customer of the store, bought Cosabella lingerie and Chantelle bras during the shopping spree.

Jureckova said $2,400 "is a lot of money for underwear and lingerie."

Vega, who prosecutors say has used 17 aliases, pleaded not guilty Wednesday at her arraignment to two counts of third-degree grand larceny, one count of fourth-degree grand larceny and four counts of issuing a bad check. County Court Judge Martin Efman ordered her held on $100,000 bond or $50,000 cash bail.

Vega rented a Westhampton home in summer 2009 and rode in rented limousines and town cars to Hamptons charity events, Assistant District Attorney Jodi Franzese said Thursday at Vega's bail hearing in Suffolk County Court. The hearing was adjourned to Friday.

SEE PHOTOSHangin' in the Hamptons: July 2010

The home and Vega's cars, including a Lamborghini, also were rented or purchased with bad checks, Franzese said. More charges against Vega are likely, she said.

Vega's attorney, Susan Ambro of the Legal Aid Society, declined to comment.

At the time of the purchases, Vega told merchants that her wealthy husband had died recently, Franzese said. Franzese told reporters it was unclear whether Vega was ever married.

"The store owners got to know her, felt bad for her and let her use bad checks," Franzese said outside court. "She has an incredibly good story. Every victim I've spoken to believed her story until it became undone."