Ginny Hopkins has waited tables at Johnny's Downtown in Cleveland for 20 years. In that […]
Tag: Tax refunds
Tax Refunds From ‘Secret Government Accounts’ Still Turning Out to Be Bogus
What’s most interesting about this particular scam is that it involved more people – 55 – than some accounting firms’ entire headcount.
A grand jury has indicted 55 people for participating in scams that tried to bilk the government out of more than $250 million in undeserved tax refunds, prosecutors in California said on Monday. Thirty-two indictments were returned by the grand jury accusing the people of various schemes to obtain the refunds. Millions of dollars were paid out, including a check worth almost $1.2 million, the prosecutors said. The owners of one California company were accused of making presentations that claimed customers could get tax refunds from a “secret government account” after making payments to the company and agreeing to pay a percentage of any refunds they received, the prosecutors said.
Grand jury indicts 55 for $250 million in tax scams [Reuters]
Wife of Man Who Received Tax Refund Without Filing Tax Return Under the Impression the IRS Was Letting This One Go
Typically if you receive a $6,000 tax refund check in the mail, it’s something you’ve been expecting.
Such was not the case for James King who had a check cut to him back in February but unfortunately it’s due to case of identity theft. Right now the IRS can’t make heads or tails of the situation and despite the mix-up/criminal activity, Mr King’s wife figured that this was opportunity:
“She was ready to spend it,” King said of his wife with a laugh. “She was ready to go cash it and spend it. She had a to-do list right from the get-go.”
Pastor Withheld Communion Because ‘It’s a Spiritual Thing,’ Not Because Members Kept Their Tax Refunds for Themselves
There are demons in his flock!
Pastor Calls Flock Devils, Demons: MyFoxHOUSTON.com
[via
Ohio, like many states, is in a bit of a budget pickle and perhaps this level of vigilance is part of the reason. Denise Bossetti received a notice in the mail that indicated she was due $200 million but was skeptical (even with the letterhead). Apparently 9,700 Ohioans received notices of inflated refunds and the Ohio Department of Taxation claims this is a new one and that “The problem has been fixed.” Probably a good idea. Woman gets $200 million tax-return notice — but it was mistake [Sandusky Register via AT] Allegedly! Knowing the city of Lincoln, Nebraska like we do, it’s entirely possible that these two bros were simply still not over the Husker football team’s dismal display in the last two games of the season and this shitty refund was simply the kernel that busted the storage bin. Lincoln police said one man was arrested after he refused to leave H&R Block when he became upset with his tax refund. And the man’s brother is accused of stealing an employee’s vehicle, according to police. Authorities were called when Joshua Brown, 26, refused to leave the H&R Block on O Street. They said he was upset with his refund and insisted on talking with all the tax professionals in the building. Officers said they removed him from the property and cited him for trespassing and fail to disperse. A half-hour later, officers said they were called back to the same business regarding a stolen Ford Explorer. An employee found her car and keys missing, police said. Officers said Brown was inside the business with his brother, 31-year-old Michael Medina. Police said they found the Ford Explorer in the parking lot across from the brothers’ apartment on 10th Street. Police said Medina was arrested on auto theft charges. Police: Man Upset With Tax Refund, Brother Charged With Auto Theft [KETV] Presumably, because the IRS wouldn’t possibly think to question liens taken out against government employees: Thanh Viet Jeremy Cao, 28, of Rancho Santa Margarita and Las Vegas, is accused of taking out 22 false liens ranging from $25 million to $300 million against employees of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Secret Service and the Internal Revenue Service, as well as false liens against four federal judges, the Department of Justice announced Wednesday. Cao, whose business was Phoenix Financial Management Group in Lake Forest, filed fraudulent forms with the IRS on behalf of six clients “that grossly overstate his customers income and withholding to get grossly inflated tax refund checks,” according to a complaint filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. Cao used a theory called “redemption” or “commercial redemption” – which prosecutors called a “rejected tax defier theory.” This theory claims that the U.S. Treasury keeps millions in a secret treasury account for each taxpayer. The secret account can be used to pay a taxpayer’s debts and tax liabilities if a taxpayer sends the IRS and banks certain documents, the theory goes. “Cao’s theory is complete fiction,” the complaint reads. Jesus, man. Not even an original crackpot theory. Spend some of those 223 possible years working on developing something new. Man accused of $20 billion tax fraud [OC Register] We don’t mean to crush anyone’s dreams of walk-offs or eating disorders but sometimes when you’re not sure if things are working out in your modeling career, you have to be able to recognize the signs when they appear. Nyemah Johnson, who models under the name Nyemah Marxx, falsely claimed he made $550,000 working for an environmental group and was entitled to the six-figure refund, prosecutors said. He was one of five people arrested last week in a $1.1 million tax scheme that prosecutors said was led by Queens accountant Diana Rabin. The bright side, of course, is that there is no such thing as bad publicity and assuming Mr Marxx has access to something a step above a public defender, he’ll manage to stay out of jail for too long and maybe then he’ll be able to land the “shirtless bro” gig outside the A&F. Manhattan model, Nyemah Marxx, is caught in $200,000 tax scam [NYDN] Taxpayers in Hawaii, Iowa, North Carolina, New York, and Rhode Island expecting a refund may have to exercise some patience, as these states have already declared their intentions to delay cutting those checks to its citizens. And don’t get to excited about receiving any interest on your already interest-free loan you gave them; many states have to withhold refunds for at least 60 days before interest has to be paid. Pulling this type of a stunt will get you nowhere in a popularity contest but hell, they don’t really have much of a choice: Scott D. Pattison, the executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers, said that it was “exceptionally unusual” for so many states to delay refunds, as they have throughout the current economic downturn. “I think it’s just an indicator of how bad things have been,” Mr. Pattison said in an interview. “It’s politically, obviously, a problem. Also, I think from a policy standpoint, it’s a little hard to justify — this is the taxpayers’ overpayment that is due them.” Obviously this is going to cause some tea-baggish belly aching but it is pointed out later in the article, if taxpayers really want to do something about this problem, they have the ability to make some changes themselves to avoid this in the future: Verenda Smith, a spokeswoman for the Federation of Tax Administrators…said she hoped the troubles would prompt more taxpayers to file earlier; file electronically, which allows for much quicker processing time; and change their withholding status with their employers so they would not overpay so much. “You really shouldn’t give it to your state government as a no-interest loan, and then have to cool your heels while you wait to get it back,” she said. We’ve mentioned this before but it bears repeating – adjusting your withholding to get a big refund is stupid. We’d say that the states keeping it out of your hands was probably a good thing but then again, the state can waste the money just as well. • Should the IRS Fill Out Our Tax Returns? [TaxVox] Bob Weinberger, a senior fellow at the Aspen Institute Initiative on Financial Security and a former top executive at the tax prep firm H&R Block. Bob counters that the “fatal flaw” of such a system is that it could delay refunds for months. For many taxpayers, Bob argues, getting a check from IRS in April is a key to their annual financial planning, and postponing that refund would generate a huge backlash. Bob also said such a system would be a huge drain on IRS resources. While this likely true, the root of the problem is the “check from the IRS is key to financial planning” part. If these people need the money so bad, they should adjust their withholding so they don’t pay in so much during the year. Perhaps that’s not an easy concept to grasp, so if we say “You’re giving the government an interest-free loan for 12 months,” that will help. • HK charges KPMG man with bribery [FT] • CFO Job Options Opening Up [FINS] • Rangel Loses Support in House [WSJ] Charlie Rangel will Never mess with people when it comes to rent-controlled apartments. They’ll turn on you like Judas. In the meeting, Mr. Rangel refused to quit as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and instead said he’d think overnight about the matter before deciding whether to step down or face an uncertain vote. After the one-hour meeting broke, Mr. Rangel told reporters he would stay on. “You bet your life,” he said. Pressed further, Mr. Rangel, raising his voice, said emphatically: “Yes, and I don’t lie to the press.” There you have it. You want Rangs out? It’ll be over his dead body. Since he’s 79, it might just come to that. • Taxpayers Have $1.3 Billion in Unclaimed Refunds [TaxProf Blog] • SEC to beef up its NYC office in 2010 [Reuters] As we still tread in the wake of the Joe Stack attack on the IRS, it seems that bizarro things are happening all over this great land of ours and many of them have to do with taxes and/or the IRS. Jailbirds requesting fraudulent refunds and receiving them, IRS-inspired bulldozing of houses and now we’ve learned about a woman who tried to kill her husband who wouldn’t share their tax refund money. And like Joe, Bulldozer Terry and the Florida inmates, the woman is pretty satisfied with her actions: Investigators say the woman then went into the city of St. Louis and threw the gun in a sewer. Police contacted the woman a short time later and she turned herself in. Police say she didn’t seem sorry. This lady can’t be all bad; she was thinking about the kids when she threw that gun in the river. There’s no indication that the husband in this little caper was just a greedy SOB or if his not-so-good sharing skills were justified due to a spendy Mrs. Regardless, it’s seems that every hour brings another story that strengthens the argument that taxes are the cause of all the strife and violence in this country. We should have taken the IRS shotgun shopping spree as a sign. [h/t TaxProf and Tax Update]
Ohio Mistakenly Notified a Woman That She Was Due a $200 Million Tax Refund
Area Man Steals Car After Learning About His Brother’s Crappy Tax Refund
Breaking: Requesting Huge Tax Refunds Based on Crackpot Theories Still Being Attempted
Young Mr Cao wasn’t just doing this out of spite. Oh my lord, no. He had a theory behind his request for $20 billion in refunds:
California Man Indicted in Las Vegas for Filing False Liens Against Federal Employees & Filing False Tax Forms [DOJ]
Earlier:
Give It Up Tax Protesters, You’re Just Screwing Yourselves
One Possible Sign that the Modeling Career Isn’t Working: You’re Claiming Bogus Tax Refunds
One sure sign that you won’t be America’s Next Top Model (or the person fetching ANTM’s rice crackers) is that you find yourself claiming to have earned $550,000 working for an “environmental group” and then requesting a $200,000 refund for that “work”:
State Governments, Seeking to Be Less Popular, Delay Tax Refunds
Accounting News Roundup: The Debate Over IRS-prepared Tax Returns; KPMG HK Senior Manager Arrested for Bribery; CFOs Starting to See Job Options | 04.09.10
Some say, YES! At the very least the Service could get the ball rolling, “by filling in your wage income, exemptions, and standard deduction and perhaps even figuring some other deductions and credits. This…could be a huge benefit for those who file Forms 1040A and 1040EZ.” Naturally, the taxpayer has to approve the return prior the actual “filing” of it but this would potentially assist millions of Americans who are otherwise stumped by 1040s of any stripe.
The other side of this argument is that it will delay refunds:
Leung Sze-chit, a senior manager in the Hong Kong office, has been arrested on corruption charges after offering a co-worker a $12,280 bribe related to a client’s IPO. The FT reports that the firm learned of the situation via its internal hotline, “After investigation, the member of staff in question was suspended by KPMG and a report was then made . . . to the relevant authorities.” So yes, to answer some of you, people do call those internal hotlines.
After hunkering down for the last couple of years or so, CFOs are starting to see some new job options. FINS reports that “Some felt loyalty to organizations in financial straits, while others hesitated to jump given uncertainty about potential landmines at other companies.” Now that growth is slowly creeping back, “some companies are likely to find they need a different type of executive in the role. And some CFOs may even find themselves in line for positions higher up the corporate ladder.”
(UPDATE) Accounting News Roundup: Rangel
Says He’s Not Quitting as Ways & Means Chair; IRS Is Sitting on $1.3 Billion in Unclaimed Refunds; SEC Adding Muscle in New York | 03.03.10
You can ignore what’s written below, except the part about rent-controlled apartments.not be quitting (temporarily sayeth Charlie Rangel) as the Chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee. If you (read: Republicans) want him out, you’ll have to vote him out. Bad news for Chuck is that the Republicans in the House and several of his fellow Democrats are poised to do just that, “As many as 30 House Democrats could join 178 House Republicans in voting to oust Mr. Rangel as head of the Ways and Means Committee…a substantially higher number than in previous votes on his removal.”
That’s just for 2006. California leads the charge with over $150 million, followed by Texas with $114 million, and Florida with $110 million. 1.4 million tax-hating Americans have until April 15th of this year to claim and then the money goes straight to Goldman Sachs.
Here’s a possible gig for those of you that are still looking for work. The not-so-new but constantly improving (?!?) SEC is looking to hire a few good men and women for its New York office. Having got the scratch to put a few more hands on deck, the Commission is looking for 18 people for its enforcement team and 15 for its examination staff. There’s no indication that this will solve the SEC’s “idiots” problem but maybe you can at least land a job.
Even More Tax-Related Violence: Wife Shoots at Refund Hogging Husband
“She felt more than justified. She cooperated very well, with the reasoning why she fired the shots, as well as recovering the gun. She said she didn’t want a child to find the gun in the sewer,” says Daniel O’Conner, the Assistant Chief of Police for Pine Lawn.