Big rigged; fearsome foursome; NYPD blue; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
Union City, Georgia: Truck driver Dantavious Jackson, 39, who operated a ghost tax prep business, has pleaded guilty to making claims for refunds of false pandemic-related employment tax credits.
As described in the plea agreement, Jackson owned and operated a trucking business. On the side, he also prepared taxes for a fee. Between June 2022 and August 2023, he defrauded the U.S. by preparing and filing 35 Forms 941 for himself and two clients that falsely claimed they were entitled to receive $4,112,297 in refunds based on fraudulently claimed Employee Retention Credits. The 941s Jackson prepared and filed with the IRS listed employees and wages that did not exist.
The Treasury paid $1,567,855 in fraudulent refunds to Jackson and his clients; Jackson also prepared and filed the returns as a ghost preparer.
He faces up to 20 years in prison, a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.
Grand Prairie, Texas: Four tax preparers convicted of defrauding the IRS of nearly $8 million have been sentenced to a combined 105 months in prison.
Festus Adenisimi, 65, of Mansfield, Texas, owned the prep business FA Tax, where he and other tax preparers prepared fraudulent returns for clients, often causing the IRS to issue bogus refunds. The estimated loss to the IRS totaled more than $7.5 million.
Adenisimi pleaded guilty last year to falsely preparing returns and admitted to fraudulently obtaining two Paycheck Protection Program loans totaling $760,415. In March, Adenisimi was sentenced to 57 months in prison and ordered to pay $10,283,737.65 in restitution.
Three additional tax preparers who worked for FA Tax have also pleaded guilty to preparing false returns and have been sentenced:
Sunshyne Endurance Ogungbemi, 37, of Waxahachie, Texas, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay $7,533,550.84 in restitution.Chris Mary Tijerina, 40, of Crandall, Texas, was sentenced to 15 months in prison and ordered to pay $7,560,661.69 in restitution.Most recently, Cynthia Bradley, 45, of Belleville, Illinois, was sentenced to 15 months in prison and ordered to pay $5,768,106.28 in restitution.
Mobile, Alabama: Brandy Davis, 42, has been sentenced to five years of probation in connection with tax fraud.
She operated Davis Tax Service with her cousin, Kenneshia Davis, at three locations in Mobile. IRS records show that she underreported her income by more than $1 million in 2015 and 2016, and failed to file any returns for 2017 despite having significant income.
Kenneshia Davis, was recently sentenced to a year and a day of incarceration and ordered to pay $67,975 in restitution.
Brandy Davis was also ordered to pay $53,435 in restitution.
Warren, Ohio: Business owner Sidney L. Glover Jr., of Warren, Ohio, has pleaded guilty to failing to report three years’ business earnings to the IRS.
Glover was the sole owner of Teaching Excellence, which provided home healthcare services for individuals with disabilities. Most of the company’s income was generated from the Ohio Department of Disabilities, which receives its funding through Ohio Medicaid.
IRS records analysis confirmed that the defendant did not file income tax returns for 2015 and 2016, but he eventually prepared and filed those documents two years later, in April 2018. At that time, he also filed for 2017.
During the investigation, authorities learned that Glover’s business had in fact generated more than $1 million in gross receipts for 2015, 2016 and 2017 combined, and that he did not report those earnings. Investigators also found that Glover had spent some of the unreported business earnings on various personal expenses.
In total, his conduct resulted in a loss of some $155,000 to the U.S. Treasury.
Glover, who pleaded guilty in May, faces up to three years in prison.
New York: Dennis Ostermann, of East Rockaway, New York, a former sergeant with the New York City Police Department, has pleaded guilty to one count of aiding and assisting in the preparation of a false and fraudulent U.S. income tax return.
Ostermann served as controller of a union that represents current and former sergeants of the NYPD and as a partner of HB Consultants Inc. In 2018 and 2019, he paid $150,000 from HBC’s bank account to a third party on behalf of the former president of the union. Ostermann then prepared HBC’s U.S. income tax returns and falsely reported that the $150,000 payment was for legal fees.
He faces up to three years in prison. Sentencing is Aug. 29.
Providence, Rhode Island: Juan Carlos Nunez Rodriguez, a Dominican national illegally present in the U.S. who trafficked fentanyl, who was found to be in possession of stolen personal ID information of nearly 1,000 individuals, and who was found to have filed hundreds of fraudulent returns to obtain tens of thousands of dollars in pandemic-related tax credit payments, has been sentenced to four years in prison.
In September 2023, following a two-month investigation into his drug trafficking, Rhode Island authorities searched the apartment of Rodriguez and seized 613 grams of fentanyl, which represented some 306,500 lethal doses.
Agents also seized Treasury checks addressed to different individuals, more than three dozen fraudulent federal returns in envelopes addressed to the IRS and stolen personal ID information of 976 individuals. A follow-up IRS investigation found that he fraudulently filed at least 15 tax returns for which he received and deposited refund checks, and that he was in possession of 43 refund checks in amounts from $1,400 to $1,800.
Rodriguez, who pleaded guilty in October, was also sentenced to a year of supervised release and ordered to pay $66,112 in restitution to the IRS. An immigration detainer has also been lodged by ICE.
Paramus, New Jersey: CPA Ofer Gabbay has pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the U.S. by promoting fraudulent tax shelters to high-income clients.
Between 2018 and 2019, Gabbay conspired with others, including Jack Fisher, James Sinnott and their assistant Kate Joy, to promote fraudulent syndicated conservation easement tax shelters that facilitated high-income taxpayers claiming unwarranted and inflated charitable contribution deductions in connection with the donation of a conservation easement over land. Gabbay and others instructed clients to backdate checks, agreements and other documents to support the unwarranted deductions. Gabbay then prepared false returns for his participating clients.
Fisher and Sinnott have been sentenced for their roles in the scheme. Joy remains a fugitive.
Gabbay faces up to five years in prison as well as a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.
Los Angeles: Real estate broker Gabriel David Guerrero has pleaded guilty to obstructing IRS efforts to collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid taxes.
He did not timely file individual income tax returns for many years. After the IRS assessed taxes against Guerrero and attempted to collect, Guerrero took steps to conceal his income and assets, making extensive use of cash and cashier’s checks, submitting a form to the IRS that significantly understated his income, and using a nominee bank account to deposit income.
Sentencing is Sept. 15. He faces up to three years in prison as well as a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.
