57 months in prison
US District Judge Brian R. Martinotti has sentenced a 33-year-old New Jersey man to 57 months in prison for a gambling-linked, $4.4m conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service.
In January, Omar Khater of Fairfield pleaded guilty before Judge Martinotti in Newark federal court to one count of the conspiracy for which he was jailed, and also “one charge to commit wire fraud.”
The US Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey (USAO-NJ) took to X Wednesday with news of the tax preparer’s sentence:
Along with a relative from Arizona named Walid Khater, court documents reveal the first step in the Khater pair’s tax scam was to steal identities. Using these stolen identities, Omar submitted false tax returns for “illicit personal financial gain,” IRS-Criminal Investigation, Newark Field Office Special Agent in Charge Jenifer L. Piovesan stated.
Gambling and lottery angle
According to a USAO-NJ press release on Wednesday, the Khater duo submitted the tax documents to the IRS online making false claims unbeknownst to the victims. The pair falsely claimed “that the taxpayers listed on those documents had earned certain income or won thousands – and in some cases millions – of dollars in gambling and lottery winnings,” according to US Attorney Philip R. Sellinger.
claimed tax withholdings on the falsified income
In addition, the Khater relatives claimed tax withholdings on the falsified income or gambling winnings that generated “refund payments from the IRS.”
According to the DOJ, the false filings prompted the IRS to pay out “lucrative tax refunds, which the Khaters and others directed to various bank accounts that they controlled […] in New Jersey and elsewhere.”
End of the line
While Omar must now serve four years and nine months behind bars, Judge Martinotti also sentenced him to three years of supervised release, plus ordered him to pay restitution of $4.49m.
In a warning to others committing tax crimes, IRS Special Agent Piovesan said her criminal investigation arm would “continue to vigorously investigate individuals who attempt to steal taxpayer money from the U.S. Treasury.”
