A woman from Georgia faces up to 30 years in prison after she recently pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to filing more than $3 million in fraudulent tax returns on behalf of her clients.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Macon, Ga. reported last week that 33-year-old Jessica Crawford pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aiding in the preparation of false income tax returns.
District Judge Tilman “Tripp” Self has scheduled sentencing for March, but beside the prison term she also faces a fine of $1 million.
Crawford operated Crawford Tax Services on Commerce Boulevard, a business area off Atlanta Highway in Athens.
The FBI reported it was investigating a multi-state unemployment benefit scheme during the pandemic when agents discovered text messages between Crawford and a client, who had created a fake business to fraudulently obtain benefits.
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Crawford profited by receiving a percentage of the gains, according to the U.S. Attorney. The criminal investigations division of the IRS joined the investigation and an undercover agent met with Crawford to have tax returns filed, according to the report.
Crawford asked the agent, posing as a customer, if he did anything on the side and he responded no, but said he did mow his aunt’s grass sometimes.
The report says “Crawford said that was good enough.”
No income or expense amounts were provided, but she created a “Schedule C business” for landscaping on the customer’s federal income return and filed a fictitious loss of $19,373. On the return, federal agents also noted she filed an earned income tax credit, a child tax credit, and a business income deduction, which called for a fraudulent federal income tax return of $12,359.
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As a result, the IRS reported it began a review of 1,261 tax returns filed by Crawford over the tax years of 2020 through 2021.
Those returns show Crawford fraudulently filed tax returns on behalf of clients that resulted in losses to the IRS of more than $3 million, according to the report.
“Jessica Crawford lied and took advantage of funds designed to help those who were truly in need during the pandemic,” FBI Agent Sean Burke of the Atlanta office said in a statement released with the report.
Demetrius Hardeman, the agent in charge of the IRS Criminal Investigations Office in Atlanta, released a statement that Crawford “was an unscrupulous return preparer who allowed greed to cloud her judgment and neglect her responsibilities to help clients prepared and file a true and correct tax return.”
Hardeman encouraged people to choose their tax preparer carefully before tax season begins in January.
Source: Georgia woman faces prison time for creating fraudulent tax returns
