NEW YORK CITY — A federal appeals court has ruled that William A. Trudeau, 50, who is a former owner of Newtown Oil Company and a former Norwalk land developer, will have his current prison sentence reviewed. Trudeau is serving a 15 2/3- year sentence for operating a mortgage fraud scheme in Fairfield County.

Trudeau was sentenced in February 2013 in US District Court in New Haven following a jury trial. Trudeau is serving time at Devens FMC in Ayer, Mass. His current prison release date is in April 2025.

In October 2012, a jury found Trudeau guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, mail fraud and wire fraud, and also guilty of one count of wire fraud. The jury found him not guilty of other charges.

The appeals court on April 15 found that Trudeau’s sentencing by US District Judge Janet Hall was “substantively reasonable,” but that one aspect of the calculations on the length of his sentence requires technical review. The review by the trial court may result in a shorter sentence for Trudeau or allowing the existing sentence to stand.

The crimes for which Trudeau was convicted involved bilking people of more than $4.2 million. Trudeau is represented by Attorney Ross Garber.

In November 2008, Trudeau was convicted in Danbury Superior Court of swindling Newtown Oil Company customers in 2002. In that case, a judge spared Trudeau from serving prison time because he came up with almost $122,000 in restitution to be distributed to oil company customers, who were bilked out of that money in late 2002, when the firm failed to honor fraudulent prepaid contracts for home heating fuel delivery.

In that case, a judge gave Trudeau a lengthy suspended prison sentence, plus probation, intended to serve as a deterrent against his again committing white-collar crimes.

In the Newtown Oil case, the judge had found Trudeau guilty of nine larceny-based felonies in the oil company scam involving the firm’s failure to deliver #2 home heating fuel to about 1,400 customers from nine towns who had entered prepaid fuel contracts with the firm.

Trudeau, whose criminal history includes approximately 13 felony convictions, has been imprisoned since August 2011, when his bond was revoked in the Fairfield County mortgage fraud case.