Egregious; Time runs out; third time’s the charm; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
Salem, Massachusetts: Resident Roosevelt Fernandez has pleaded guilty in connection with two schemes involving COVID-19 relief funds and tax returns for others.
Fernandez applied for 10 EIDLs, either in his own name or in the names of entities he controlled. In June 2020, he applied for an EIDL under the name Soluciones Multi Service and submitted a false tax filing in support of the application. The Small Business Administration deposited $124,900 into a bank account controlled by Fernandez from which he withdrew more than $80,000 in cash over the next two weeks. In August of that year, Fernandez applied for an EIDL in the name of another business using fraudulent tax filing information; the SBA deposited $149,900 into the same bank account.
He used the identities of various individuals to submit fraudulent state and federal returns, a number of which included fraudulent W-2s purportedly issued by employers but for whom the named taxpayer did not work. Various fraudulent refunds were deposited into an account in the name of Soluciones Multi Service. A May 2020 fraudulent EIP was deposited into this same account. Fernandez was depicted on ATM surveillance footage depositing another fraudulent tax refund check into this account.
Investigation uncovered some 40 fraudulent returns associated with Fernandez, totaling more than $620,000 in requested refunds.
The charges of wire fraud…
