Area tax preparer indicted for fraud
Published 9:50 am Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Nearly a year after a local tax services was raided, the owner of the business is facing charges levied by a Federal Grand Jury this week in Mobile.
Alice Mobley of Monroeville has been indicted on 80 counts of charges ranging from conspiracy, preparing and filing false tax returns, mortgage fraud and wire fraud.
Mobley, who previously owned Preyear Tax and Check Cashing, LLC., faces the charges that have placed her future in jeopardy. Offices in Atmore and Thomasville, as well as one in Mississippi and Texas, were all owned by Mobley.
The local office was the subject of a raid last March when federal agents with assistance from officers with the Atmore Police Department and agents with the Internal Revenue Service surrounded Preyear’s Tax Service and Check Cashing LLC and served a federal search warrant. The business was located at the corner of North Main and East Ridgeley streets near downtown Atmore.
During their raid, agents removed boxes of documents presumed to be paperwork filed by the Ridgeley Street business, as well as, computers and other equipment, all of which was placed in government vehicles for transport. At least one vehicle was also searched during the raid.
The indictment handed down this week was filed in the Southern District of Alabama by the Federal Grand Jury and came after evidence was submitted in the case. The case was investigated by agents of the Mobile office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; Criminal Investigation; Internal Revenue Service, the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Housing and Urban Development; and the 35th Judicial Circuit Task Force in Monroeville. The case will be prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Gregory Bordenkircher and Charles Baer on behalf of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Alabama.
Tax returns involved in the investigation totaled about $68 million in tax refunds, which were issued based on earned income credit and other tax credits on the returns.
In the investigation report, Mobley and her business used a variety of fraudulent schemes involving the sale and misuse of the identity of dependents in their preparation of returns. The investigation also revealed information that alleges Mobley prepared federal income tax returns falsely claimed dependents to which the taxpayer’s were not entitled. The information may have been with or without her permission of the person supporting a dependent and entitled to claim that dependent on their tax return, and with or without the permission and knowledge of the person in whose name the tax return was filed. These actions are believed to have allowed the return to falsely claim deductions for dependents, earned income credits, child and dependent care credits and education credits.
Mobley has also been charged with mortgage fraud and wire fraud in regard to applications she made for mortgages to CitiBank and Wells Fargo.
If found guilty on the charges against her, Mobley faces up to 30 years in prison plus fines up to $250,000.