Taxable Talk

Robert "Tractor" Traylor, a former NBA player for Milwaukee, Cleveland, Charlotte, and New Orleans, pleaded guilty on Friday to a charge of preparing a false tax return. Mr. Traylor, 29, attempted to conceal assets of his cousin, Quasand Lewis, according to this AP story. Mr. Lewis, Traylor's cousin, was recently convicted of drug trafficking and money laundering--he distributed 22,000 pounds of marijuana in the Detroit metropolitan area.

Here's a wonderful quote from the story: "Robert Traylor is a basketball player, not a businessman," Traylor's attorney, Steven Fishman, told The Associated Press on Thursday night. "He got some bad advice and unfortunately he took it. So here we are."

Unfortunately for Mr. Traylor, the IRS doesn't appreciate lying on a tax return. Mr. Traylor could be sentenced to as much as fourteen months at ClubFed.

I haven't done a megapost with a bunch of tax schemers in some time. So before I head off to dinner, here's some fraud and evasion to munch on.

Lots of people have been filing false tax returns lately. The IRS doesn't appreciate it. These individuals worked for a shoe retailer, and allegedly came up with a nice way to make extra money: submit 107 false tax returns totaling about $250,000 in refunds. They apparently needed the money quickly, as they used Refund Anticipation Loans to instantly get their money. They're looking at spending a few years at ClubFed.

Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has asked that a court issue an injunction barring a Georgia tax preparer from preparing tax returns and from selling "tax schemes." As this press release notes, Victor Carlysle Sullivan, Jr., of Albany, Georgia is accused of bilking the US out of around $5 million.

Last year I reported on nursing home operator Jack Easterday. He was convicted on 47 counts of tax evasion. What I didn't know was that his conviction was tossed out due to a faulty jury instruction. He's going to be retried in March. The IRS has added 62 new charges to his trial; he's now accused of not paying over $10 million in payroll taxes he collected from his employees. He's looking at a substantial stay at ClubFed if found guilty.

A Newberg, Oregon man made lots of money selling mail-order divorces. He "forgot" to claim them on his tax return. The IRS didn't forget to catch up to him. William Cleveland Thompson pleaded guilty to evading taxes from 1993 to 1995 (he last filed a tax return in 1992). As this story notes, he'll be visiting ClubFed.

I again ask, what is it about strip clubs that attract tax cheats to them? Maybe it's that the businesses have lots of cash, and the owners wonder what will happen if they just don't report it. Well, that's allegedly what the owners of Dangerous Curves in the Tacony section of Philadelphia did. Their accountant prepared false tax returns enabling them to get loans. Then, an investigation of a councilman (now imprisoned) put the focus on their club. To top it off, some of the employees said that they were paid in cash (a total of about $1.4 million) that wasn't reported to the IRS. All involved are looking at three years at ClubFed plus restitution if convicted. You can read more here.

Remember Charles Lanza, of Wolcoot, CT? He had a new take on "Bowling for Dollars,"—"Skimming for Dollars" as I earlier reported. He lucked out though, and was sentenced to just six months in prison (sentencing guidelines indicated he should receive about three years) due to poor health.

Finally, remember the Florida evangelist who had the dinosaur theme park? Kent Hovind, aka "Dr. Dino," will enjoy ten years at ClubFed. As this story notes, Hovind believes that dinosaurs and humans walked the earth together but didn't believe you had to send employment taxes to the government. As the judge sentencing Hovind noted, "[he refused] to accept what the law is." He'll have plenty of time to pray about it. His wife will be sentenced in March.

The U.S. Attorney's Office replied to Richard Hatch's appeal on Friday. Hatch, the former Survivor winner who didn't pay his taxes on his $1 million prize, recently filed an appeal of his conviction. Hatch, in his appeal, alleged that he caught the producers cheating, and that's why they reneged on paying his taxes; further, he never got a chance to testify about that at his trial. Hatch is currently serving his prison sentence in Morgantown, West Virginia.

The U.S. Attorney's Office, though, has a different view. According to the Associated Press, Hatch had plenty of opportunity to bring the issue up during his trial. Hatch and his attorney were told that they could present evidence that CBS and the Survivor producers agreed to pay his taxes. CBS, by the way, denies Hatch's claims.

The AP quotes the prosecution brief, "What the court was unwilling to tolerate was a sideshow concerning whether the producers helped other contestants cheat, divorced from the key defense predicate: that this had all led to the alleged promise...Counsel's failure [to present evidence] cannot be transformed into an abuse of discretion by the court...."

For bloggers like me, I do hope that the Hatch case lasts as long as his sentence. It sure is amusing, but there is a salient point that can be gleemed from this case. No matter what others may promise to do, you are responsible for the paying of your taxes.