CI Chief Jim Lee

IRS News:

PHOENIX, Ariz. — With tax season right around the corner, IRS CI wants to provide Arizona taxpayers with tips to safeguard against criminally minded individuals wanting to steal their identities and  wallets this tax season.

“Tax crimes surge during filing season because criminals steal unknowing taxpayers’ information, hack into the servers of CPA firms and tax preparation services and victimize unsuspecting taxpayers with the false promise of huge tax refunds,” CI Chief Jim Lee said.

These are 10 tips that help avoid those crimes:

1. Look for a preparer who is available year-round.
2. Ask your tax preparer for their IRS Preparer Tax Identification Number (PTIN). All paid preparers are required to have one.

3. Make sure the tax preparer will sign the tax return they prepare for you. Look elsewhere if they won’t.
4. Tax preparers that promise larger refunds than their competition may place you at risk of being part of a criminal scheme. All taxpayers are required to pay the correct amount of taxes that they owe. 
5. Find a new tax preparer if you are asked to sign a blank tax return. You are ultimately responsible for what appears on your tax return, no matter who files it.

6. Verify where the IRS will deposit your tax refund. Your tax return should be deposited to your bank account, not your tax preparer’s.
7. The IRS will not call you threatening legal action. These calls are scams.
8. Text messages, emails and social media posts claiming to be the IRS may contain links or  malware that could compromise your personal information. Do not respond to them or click those links.
9. Protect your personal and financial information. Get An Identity Protection PIN | Internal Revenue Service (irs.gov)
10. Report fraud to law enforcement. Submit IRS Form 3949-A, Information Referral, if you suspect an individual or a business is committing fraud.

One example of an unscrupulous taxpayer to watch for is King Isaac Umoren, a former Las Vegas tax preparer. Nov. 30, 2022, Umoren was sentenced to 13 years and three months in  prison and ordered to pay $9,699,887 in restitution for filing false tax returns, aggravated  identity theft, wire fraud, money laundering, and impersonating an FBI agent. Umoren owned and operated Universal Tax Services, a tax preparation business based in Las Vegas, where he engaged in two fraud schemes. Umoren prepared and filed tax returns for clients that included false deductions and fictitious businesses to generate larger refunds than the clients were entitled and at times took fees out of clients’ tax refunds without their knowledge. Umoren also posed as an FBI agent, wearing a fake badge and tactical gear, and drove to a client’s house with police lights attached to his vehicle to demand payment of a tax preparation fee. Additionally, Umoren sold his company to victims at an inflated price of $3.8 million based on fraudulent  financial and tax documents and the stolen tax and personal identifying information of approximately 12,000 taxpayers who were not UTS clients.

Another example of an unscrupulous taxpayer to watch for is Maria Mendoza, a former Las Vegas tax preparer. Mendoza was sentenced in June to three years in prison followed by one year of supervised release for fraudulently preparing and filing over $1.2 million false income tax returns. Mendoza ran her own tax preparation business under the names Taxes & More and Taxs y Mas. She used false or inflated deductions and credits on tax returns filed on behalf of her clients. Additionally, she used her clients’ personal identifying information to falsely obtain a larger refund on her own tax returns. In total, Mendoza prepared more than 700 tax returns that claimed more than $3 million in refunds from the IRS. She caused more than $1.2 million in tax  loss. Furthermore, Mendoza inflated her clients’ refund requests without their knowledge and  stole the excess amount of those refunds. Through this scheme, Mendoza diverted over  $500,000 of her clients’ tax refund payments into her own accounts from 2013 to 2017.

The 2024 Tax Filing Season began Jan. 29, and the deadline to file, pay any tax owed or request an extension to file for most of the nation is April 15. The deadline for taxpayers in Maine and Massachusetts is April 17.

Taxpayers can create or access their Online Account at IRS.gov/account. New users should have their photo identification ready.

IRS CI is the criminal investigative arm of the IRS, responsible for conducting financial crime investigations, including tax fraud, narcotics trafficking, money-laundering, public corruption, healthcare fraud, identity theft and more. IRS CI special agents are the only federal law enforcement agents with investigative jurisdiction over violations of the Internal Revenue Code. The agency’s Phoenix Field Office stretches across Utah, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico.