Diversionary tactic; bad intentions; keeping it real; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
Cheshire, Massachusetts: Dennis Condron, 75, owner of a construction company, has agreed to plead guilty to four counts of tax fraud in connection with a multiyear income tax scheme.
Over three years, in addition to depositing customer payments to his company, D Condron Construction, Condron hid more than half a million dollars in customer checks by cashing them and diverting them to his personal accounts.
When Condron had his taxes prepared, he allegedly did not tell his preparer about the checks he was cashing and about diverting customer checks, resulting in his underreporting the gross receipts of the business by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Aristes, Pennsylvania: Linda Tarlecki has pleaded guilty to tax evasion and bank fraud.
Tarlecki was the former secretary/treasurer for Conyngham Township in Columbia County. From 2013 through 2017, Tarlecki defrauded the township and Fulton National Bank of more than $147,000 by issuing forged paychecks to herself to which she was not entitled.
Tarlecki also failed to report this additional income on her personal income taxes, resulting in a tax loss to the IRS of more than $38,000.
The maximum penalty for this offense is 35 years in prison, a term of supervised release and a fine.
Friendswood, Texas: Businessman William Christopher Womack has admitted he only reported a small amount of income to keep other federal benefits.
Womack was the sole owner of Intents Services, a company that leased industrial and special event tents, trailers and specialty vehicles locally. He concealed income by cashing business receipts at check-cashing businesses and writing fraudulent checks to fictitious employees and vendors. Womack spent the money on personal expenses, including boats, luxury vehicles, RVs and tickets to sporting events.
Womack admitted he reported only a small portion of his income on tax returns. In 2019 to 2021, he reported wages of $12,000 annually while collecting Social Security benefits ranging from $15,672 to $16,121. This was far less than he earned; for example, Womack admitted that his 2020 tax return failed to include $260,895 in income he earned from Intents Services.
He must also pay restitution to the IRS of $219,599 in tax loss resulting from the returns he filed for 2019 through 2021.
Sentencing will be Oct. 14, when Womack faces up to three years in prison and a maximum $250,000 fine.
Orlando, Florida: Three Florida men were sentenced this week for tax crimes related to a scheme to prepare false returns for clients.
Jonathan Carillo was sentenced to 121 months in prison, Franklin Carter Jr. to 84 months and Diandre T. Mentor to 36 months in prison.
From 2016 to 2020, Carter and Carrillo owned and operated Neighborhood Advance Tax, a tax prep business with a dozen offices throughout Florida. Mentor was employed there as a preparer and from 2018 and 2019 he managed the Orlando office. Carter, Carrillo, Mentor and their co-conspirators fraudulently inflated clients’ refunds by fabricating deductions and by holding periodic training sessions at which they taught other NAT employees to prepare fraudulent tax returns.
In 2020, Mentor and his co-conspirators started their own tax prep business, Smart Tax & Finance. Like NAT, Mentor and his co-conspirators prepared false returns for clients that included fabricated deductions. Mentor and his co-conspirators also taught franchise owners and employees how to prepare false returns for clients. In total, Mentor caused a tax loss to the IRS of $3,090,077.
In 2021, Carter, Carrillo, and their co-conspirators started a new tax prep business, Taxmates, which operated out of the same offices that NAT previously used. As with NAT, Carter, Carrillo, and others used Taxmates to prepare false returns for clients. Many of those returns included false deductions. Carter, Carrillo and their co-conspirators also taught franchise owners and employees how to prepare false returns. In total, they caused a tax loss to the IRS exceeding $12 million.
Several other co-conspirators have been sentenced for their roles in the scheme.
Mentor was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release and to pay some $3,090,077 in restitution to the U.S; Carter to serve three years of supervised release and to pay some $12,543,946 in restitution; and Carrillo to three years of supervised release and to pay some $12,170,066 in restitution. All three
Tampa, Florida: Exec Brian Davison has been sentenced to three years in prison for making false and fraudulent statements on tax returns.
Davison was the co-founder and former CEO of the real estate investment firm Equialt LLC, which was placed into judicial receivership following a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission complaint in 2020. Between October 2018 and December 2020, Davison caused multiple personal returns to be filed that underreported his income from Equialt and other business entities by at least $29.7 million. This resulted in a federal tax loss of $6,293,592.
Davison, who pleaded guilty in March, was ordered to pay that amount in restitution to the IRS.
Lake Forest, Illinois: Dr. Krishnaswami Sriram has been sentenced to 34 months in prison for health care fraud and for hiding assets and lying to the IRS about his ability to pay some $1.6 million in taxes, penalties and interest.
From around 2011 to 2017, Sriram evaded payment of approximately $1.6 million he owed to the IRS. He transferred ownership, in name only, of two rental properties to his children without their knowledge while he continued to receive income from the properties. He also transferred some $700,000 from bank accounts he controlled in the U.S. to accounts in India.
To fraudulently reduce the money he owed, Sriram submitted documents to the IRS as part of an offer in compromise that omitted an investment account in the United States, bank and investment accounts in India, and ownership of the rental properties.
Between 2012 and 2022, Sriram also caused false Medicare billings to be submitted for episodes of in-home physician care that did not occur. Sriram claimed to provide care for Medicare beneficiaries on dates when those individuals were either deceased or resided at inpatient facilities other than their homes. Sriram’s false statements in medical records relating to these episodes of care resulted in $136,980.36 in false billings to Medicare.
He was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release and to pay some $1.7 million in restitution to the United States.
Columbus, Ohio: Tax preparer Ali Kasimu Alston has been sentenced to the statutory maximum, 36 months, in prison for aiding in the preparation of thousands of fraudulent returns.
From at least 2015 through at least 2022, Alston owned and operated the tax prep firm Overtime Ventures LLC, d.b.a. Raining Cash Tax Service. He systematically falsified client tax returns to maximize refunds from the IRS. He filed Schedule Cs with fake businesses to maximize tax credits. For example, one false tax return for calendar year 2021 reported false losses for a home healthcare company that did not exist. The false business losses reduced the client’s taxable income, thereby decreasing the tax due and increasing the client’s claimed tax refund.
The defendant also attempted to bribe one of his former employees with $4,000 in cash to provide false information to law enforcement, which he knew at the time was investigating his tax prep business. Even after entering his guilty plea, the defendant continued to assist in the filing of false tax filings.
Alston was charged by a bill of information in September 2024 and pleaded guilty in October 2024.
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