Speedy sentencing; WWTF; no longer Confident; and other highlights of recent tax cases.

Washington, D.C.: Tax preparer Awett Tedla, now of Indianapolis, has been sentenced to 21 months in prison for conspiring to file false tax returns, wire fraud and tax evasion.

Tedla owned and operated Speedy Tax Services in Washington, D.C., and District Heights, Maryland, and from 2012 through 2016 she and her co-conspirators prepared and e-filed false income tax returns for clients that reported fictitious businesses and claimed certain tax credits, including the Earned Income Tax Credits, to inflate refunds. Tedla and her co-conspirators charged their clients different fees that depended on the size of the fraudulent refund.

In 2016, she also filed a return for herself that underreported gross receipts and taxable income from her business.

Tedla caused a tax loss to the IRS of some $171,534.

She was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release and to pay $171,534 in restitution to the United States.

Bozeman, Montana: Joseph Glen Dickey, owner of a construction company who was accused of not paying IRS employee-related taxes of more than $800,000, has admitted to tax crimes.

Dickey is the owner of Alpine Customs, a commercial construction company that has employed 60 or more individuals. As Alpine’s GM he controlled every aspect of the business, including approving payments and overseeing bank accounts. Alpine withheld payroll taxes from employees’ paychecks and was required to make quarterly deposits of those payroll taxes and additional employer payroll contributions to the IRS.

Dickey did not timely deposit several employee or employer payroll taxes from 2018 to 2021. He knew of the requirements and his bookkeepers and IRS officers repeatedly advised him of these obligations.

In total, Dickey failed to timely pay $803,374 in payroll taxes.

He faces up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release. Sentencing is Aug. 14.

Barrington, Illinois: Tax preparer Gary Sandiego has pleaded guilty to preparing false income tax returns for clients.

Sandiego owned and operated the tax prep business G. Sandiego and Associates and for tax years 2014 through 2017 prepared and filed false income tax returns for clients. Instead of relying on information provided by the clients, he either inflated or entirely fabricated expenses to falsely claim residential energy credits and employment-related expense deductions.

He caused a tax loss to the IRS of some $4,586,154.

Sentencing is Aug. 14. He faces up to three years in prison for each count as well as a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties. 

Freeport, Texas: Tax preparer Krystal Wright has pleaded guilty to aiding and assisting in the preparation and filing of false income tax returns.

Wright was the sole owner and only tax preparer at WW2F for six years. Most of her clients did not have a business nor did they discuss any business income or expenses with her. After Wright completed a return, she did not review the completed documents with clients and only provided them with the refund amount and first two pages of the return, preventing her clients from identifying overstated or false items on their returns.

From 2017 through 2020, Wright prepared and filed some 83 federal income tax returns that contained false and fraudulent items. Some included qualified solar electric property costs, gifts by cash or check, business expenses, wages, salaries, tips and supplies.

The false and fraudulent filings resulted in a total tax harm of $525,404.

Sentencing is June 26. Wright faces up to three years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Atlanta: Former municipal CFO Jimmie “Jim” A. Beard, now of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, has pleaded guilty to theft of government funds and to obstructing federal tax laws.

From about November 2011 to May 2018, Beard was CFO of the City of Atlanta with primary responsibility for oversight and management of the city’s financial condition. During his tenure, he schemed to steal money and property from the city for private use, including to pay for personal travel expenses for himself, his family, and his travel companions; to buy items for personal use, including two machine guns; to pay for travel to conferences or meetings for which the conference or meeting host reimbursed Beard; and to pay for travel that he falsely claimed to the IRS was related to his personal consulting business.

Beard stole at least tens of thousands of dollars from the city. Among other infractions, in December 2015 Beard ordered two custom-built machine guns using a $2,641.90 check from the city, telling the manufacturer that the machine guns were for the Atlanta Police Department; he kept the guns until about March 2017, when he abandoned them to the Atlanta police.

During his tenure as CFO, Beard also submitted to the IRS a return for 2013 on which he claimed that he owned a consulting business that had incurred more than $33,500 in business losses in 2013, including $12,000 for travel expenses and $7,115 for deductible M&E expenses.

In 2015, the IRS advised Beard that it was auditing that return and requested documentation to support the expenses for his consulting business. Beard falsely provided receipts for fraudulent airfare and hotels; expense reports for personal meals with his wife and personal companions; and altered receipts that hid from the IRS that the charges were incurred in connection with Beard’s work for Atlanta.

Sentencing is July 12.

Jackson, Mississippi: Tax preparer Jonathan Barefoot has been sentenced to 30 months in prison for conspiring to prepare and file false returns for clients and for preparing false returns.

He worked at Sunbelt Tax Service where he conspired with others to claim inflated refunds for clients by reporting false education credits, itemized deductions and business profits or losses on clients’ returns. Barefoot and his co-conspirators prepared thousands of fraudulent returns, causing more than $3.5 million in tax losses to the IRS.

Barefoot was also ordered to serve a year of supervised release. Four of his co-conspirators were previously sentenced to 15 to one hundred months in prison.

Canton, Ohio: Stephanie Condric has pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the IRS related to her operation of an illegal gambling business.

From 2014 through 2018, she managed and later co-owned Gametastic, an illegal gambling business. Condric and her co-conspirators did not report to the IRS the cash wages paid to Gametastic’s employees, which caused the business to underpay its employment taxes. She also filed false personal returns that concealed a portion of the income she received from Gametastic.

Condric faces up to five years in prison, as well as a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties. 

Chambersburg, Pennsylvania: Tax preparer Guibbonz Marcellus has been sentenced to 27 months in prison on 23 counts of aiding and assisting the preparation of false and fraudulent returns.

Marcellus, convicted last year, operated the tax prep business M&M Confident Multi Services from 2013 to 2016. To inflate refunds and generate business, he regularly included false numbers on the returns he prepared and filed. The returns falsely claimed, among other things, the federal fuel-tax credit, business losses, and deductions for charitable gifts and unreimbursed employee expenses.

The total loss to the government exceeded $208,000.