One of my previous jobs was assistant to an executive in a multinational corporation. Among my duties was helping my boss draft our department’s annual budget. I also was her surrogate in reviewing and processing expenses for our area’s employees, as well as making payments for other expenditures.
My boss and I worked closely on these and other projects, and over the years we also became good friends. We shared years of good and bad times, both professionally and personally, and she and I stay in touch decades later, despite being many miles apart.
So naturally, my tax crime surfing stopped on a story about a personal assistant who not only embezzled almost $2.2 million from her employer, but also failed to report her ill-gotten gains to the Internal Revenue Service.
The tax crime initially caught my eye, but what really drew me into the criminal case were the investigative reports’ characterization of the felon as a trusted employee and long-time friend of her employer-turned-victim.
I am certainly glad that my former boss and I still have a much better, still close, and unconnected to crime relationship.
Guilty plea, followed by sentencing: The Department of Justice announced in March 2023 that the Oklahoma woman, whose name I’m not posting, but which you can find in the following links, pleaded guilty to bank fraud and tax evasion over a nine-year period.
That nearly decade-long time frame was just part of the more than 38 years that she had worked directly as personal assistant to the business owner from whom she stole millions.
Last week, specifically on Tuesday, June 25, federal prosecutors announced the former assistant finally was sentenced in federal court to serve 36 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
The confessed felon also was ordered to pay restitution of $2,188,870 to her former boss. And she must pay the Internal Revenue Service $549,964 — due tax, penalties, and interest — in connection with her failure to report and pay tax on the embezzled funds.
Yes, not reporting illegal income is a tax crime.
Embezzlement history: According to court documents, the former assistant was so close to her former employer that she often was included in her family’s affairs. That trust allowed her to take advantage of her position, notably because it also provided her access to several of her victim’s bank accounts.
Federal investigators said that for nearly 10 year, the former assistant deposited funds into her personal accounts ,and paid personal credit card bills by forging the owner's deceased spouse's signature on hundreds of checks.
The woman admitted that her motives were based solely on greed. She further admitted to federal agents, which included members of the IRS Criminal Investigation unit, that until she was confronted by the owner and fired, she had no idea how much she had stolen.
The IRS did the counting for her.
Millions stolen: In her plea agreement, Fletcher admitted that from December 2012 to approximately May 2021, she embezzled funds for her own personal gain from her employer in the approximate amount of $2,188,870.
To avoid being detected, court records showed she routinely made unauthorized transfers between and among various Oklahoma bank accounts before misappropriating the funds for her own personal use. One of the many ways she fraudulently moved money, included making unauthorized transfers from some accounts into a specific individual’s account.
From there, she prepared forged checks bearing the individual’s name and made the checks payable to herself or on her own behalf. She also admitted to routinely paying her credit card bills with the unauthorized and forged checks.
As for the tax charge, the former personal assistant admitted that for tax year 2020, she failed to report $289,810 in illegally obtained income. That meant she shorted the U.S. Treasury of more than $62,067 in taxes due on the money.
Tax Felon Friday: I just sent this post to my former boss with a note reminding her of how lucky she was that I didn’t break bad while she and I worked together! 😊
Sadly, too many people do resort to criminal activity, tax-related and otherwise. Some may have understandable financial difficulties that drive them to act injudiciously. Others are like this Oklahoma woman, and let their greed and opportunity combine to ill ends.
If you want to catch up on all sorts of tax miscreants who have been charged and/or convicted, a good place to start is the ol' blogs' special Tax Felon Friday page.
You also can find more tax crime posts, notably those that were published long before I gave them a special end-of-week feature moniker, in where else, the ol’ blog’s tax crimes category. This post will be at the top of that collection right now, so just scroll down for more.
You also might find these items of interest:
- Tax evasion plea could land former Big Law partner in the Big House
- Husband of Russian social media star goes to war to settle her tax debt
- MLB superstar Ohtani’s former translator agrees to bank and tax fraud guilty plea deal
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