Fort Lauderdale woman faces 351 years in prison in tax fraud scheme

South Florida Sun-Sentinel ^ | Janaury 29, 2013 | Ihosvani Rodriguez

[ConservativeStatement]

A Fort Lauderdale woman was convicted of heading an identity theft tax fraud scheme that netted $11 million in federal tax refunds and involved the filing of approximately 2,000 fraudulent tax returns, federal prosecutors said.

Alci Bonannee, 36, of Fort Lauderdale, faces a prison sentence of up to 351 years as the primary leader in the identity theft ring, prosecutors said.

[wafflehouse]

She did not just steal once. This was a long, calculating process. She stole from all of us. ... I think it is fair that she received such a long sentence.

her biggest mistake was not getting elected first.

[muawiyah]

Your original concern was that it'd be less costly with less risk to just give yourself a dividend than to create a fake employee ~ after all, there are all the deductions for FICA, withholding, insurance, health care, state taxes, city taxes, etc.

This woman is an example of what i was discussing ~ they just create a fake person that looks real for a second to the IRS computers, and they get REFUNDS ~ they, themselves, never pay the government a dime!

[x]

No fair! When she gets out there will be intergalactic space travel, underwater cities, and maybe even the flying cars we were promised, and the rest of us will all be dead!

[Political Junkie Too]

Y’know, after a sentence goes over 100 years, they should just cut ‘em for parts.

Watch it be 350 counts with a penalty of 1 year each, to run concurrently. She'll be out in 9 months.

-PJ

[Liz]

REFERENCE-——Treasury Dept investigators estimate another $21 billion could make its way to ID thieves’ pockets over the next five years. The IRS is detecting far fewer fraudulent tax refund claims than actually occur, according to a govt audit that warned the widespread problem could undermine public trust in the U.S. tax system.

Although the IRS detected about 940,000 fraudulent returns for last year claiming $6.5 billion in refunds, there were potentially another 1.5 million undetected cases of thieves seeking refunds after assuming the identity of a dead person, child or someone else who normally wouldn’t file a tax return.

In just one example, investigators found a single address in Lansing, Mich, was used to file 2,137 separate tax returns. The IRS issued more than $3.3 million in refunds to that address.

Florida, is the epicenter of the identity theft crisis (a state overrun with latinos-—many of whom are Cuban-—who are also involved in massive Medicare/Aid fraud). Just three addresses in Florida filed more than 500 returns totaling more than $1 million in refunds for each address.......Florida was also the scene of a massive subprime mtge scam-—with latinos colluding to bilk millions-—leaving Americans holding the bag.

In another troubling scenario, hundreds of refunds were deposited into the same bank account——a red flag for investigators searching for ID thieves— who may be filing for refunds for multiple people. In one instance, the IRS deposited 590 refunds totaling more than $900,000 into one account.

SOURCE http://www.twincities.com/national/ci_21218839/irs-missing-billions-id-theft

[Temujinshordes]

One or more employees of the IRS who wrote or implemented policies that let this kind of fraud happen should be in adjacent cells with her. Someone somewhere in the IRS had to come up with the idea that they “should go ahead and send the checks and we will verify later”.

[muawiyah]

Congress did that ~ the IRS employees know how to catch this stuff but it also delays other refunds to honest taxpayers.

Hence my book on how to do this ~ I think it could encourage enough tens of thousands of tax cheats to think they could get away with it and actually get Congress to GIT OUT THE WAY and let the collections people do their job.

[Joe 6-pack]

"God forbid they call it what it is- Life in prison."

Something about seeing the whole tally that can get your attention. Of course it also has its purpose. As somebody else point out elsewhere, it could be 351 counts with a one year sentence...the could run concurrently or consecutively.

Where it really comes into play is on appeals where some counts may be overturned and others stand, you need an overall tally to deduct from.

[dinodino]

I don’t think she created fake people—rather, she filed fraudulent returns on behalf of real people.

[muawiyah]

She had fake W-2s. You can make them with the standard taxpackages used to file your taxes. Every item you need to create something that looks like an employer created it is readily available at Staples.

[Temujinshordes]

Which means we need two things: A sunset law wherein all laws not specifically and individually renewed expire after 5 years, and members of congress in the adjacent cells.

[dinodino]

Good point. Also, elimination of income tax witholding would prevent this from ever occurring. If a taxpayer simply mailed a check once per annum, this couldn’t happen.