The Florida ‘Queen of Tax Fraud’ is sentenced to 21 years
According to the Internal Revenue Service, fraud involves obtaining things of value from other people by using deceit. Tax fraud is a form of fraud that involves evading paying money due for taxes while knowing it is wrong. A Florida woman was recently sentenced to 21 years in prison on both weapons and tax fraud charges.
Naming herself the ‘Queen of Tax Fraud,’ this woman received the highest sentence for tax fraud anyone from the Tampa area has been subject to for this crime in the past three years, says the Tampa Tribune. This woman allegedly stole millions of dollars from tax payers to do things like throw her daughter a birthday party that cost $30,000 and purchase a vehicle for $90,000.
It was originally estimated that this woman stole approximately $3.1 million from tax payers. However, upon later calculations, it was discovered that this woman was accountable for stealing anywhere from $7 to $20 million.
As the mother of three young children, the woman charged for this crime pleaded with the judge at the sentencing to reduce the amount of time she was required to spend in prison so she wouldn’t have to be away from her children. However, the judge responded that she should have thought about this before engaging in tax crime.
Although committing tax fraud is a criminal offense, there are a variety of things which this woman did to encourage authorities to catch her for fraud. The woman did things like:
- Used the stolen money to live a lavish lifestyle
- Talked about her crimes on popular social media websites
- Used her real name on the Internet when talking about fraud
- Taunted the police and authorities online
According to Forbes, officials worked for over two years to catch this woman for her crimes and her presence on the Internet and other actions did not help her get away with stealing from the government.
After an individual files their taxes, the IRS has a three year period to investigate and perform an audit to check for chances that tax fraud occurred and six years if 25% of the person’s income was omitted from their taxes. Many people use this rule to get away with not filing their taxes or underreporting their income. However, the IRS can come after an individual for tax fraud at any time, says Forbes.
If you are currently being investigated for tax fraud due to something that happened in the past, consult with an attorney to determine what you can do to assert your legal rights during this time.