INDIANAPOLIS — Anita Marie Rodriguez Perez of Sellersburg has been sentenced to 18 months in federal prison and ordered to pay nearly $2 million in restitution after admitting she prepared and filed hundreds of fraudulent tax returns.
Perez was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker to prison and two years of supervised release for five counts of aiding and assisting in the preparation and presentation of false and fraudulent tax returns. She was also ordered to pay $1,954,673.30 to the federal government.
“Tax fraud undermines the integrity of our financial system and unfairly shifts the burden onto honest taxpayers,” said Tom Wheeler, United States attorney for the Southern District of Indiana in a press release. “When tax preparers exploit their expertise to deceive the government, they not only violate the law – they betray the trust of their clients. These cases are complex and time-consuming to investigate, and the efforts of IRS-CI send a clear message: accountability applies to everyone.”…