Tax Fraud

A Terra Bella man has been sentenced to 18 months in prison as part of a $13.3-million tax-fraud case described by federal investigators as one of the largest in Central California. A federal judge on Monday also sentenced Antonio Ramos Ramos, 31, to three years of supervised release. His wife, Blanca Ramos, 28, was placed on three years' probation.

A federal appeals judge has cleared Raul Salinas, the jailed brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, of tax fraud charges. Judge Raul Melgoza Figueroa ordered the charges dropped after finding that there was too little evidence to convict Salinas. He remains in a maximum-security prison in Mexico City on a host of other charges, including murder. Salinas was arrested in 1995 on charges that he plotted the 1994 assassination of top ruling party official Jose Francisco Ruiz

A Moreno Valley woman was arrested on suspicion of tax fraud Thursday, accused of two counts of falsifying W-2 forms to obtain a state income tax refund, authorities said. Sylvia Chabre Christopher, 36, used a false W-2 to obtain a refund of $2,329, said Franchise Tax Board spokesman Barry Gilbert. Each count carries a maximum of three years in prison. Three San Bernardino County residents have received jail time this month for receiving refunds from fake tax forms. The cases are unrelated.

A self-described psychic from Thousand Oaks pleaded guilty Friday in federal court to helping her in-laws hide proceeds from their Manhattan Beach psychic business from the Internal Revenue Service. Nasta Merino, 23, admitted a single charge of conspiring to defraud the IRS. She is free on bond and scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 2. Merino admitted helping Sonia and Steve Merino hide income from the 1998 and 1999 tax years by asking clients to pay in cash or other goods.

A 61-year-old man on the run for seven years pleaded guilty Wednesday to failing to report to the U.S. marshal to serve a sentence stemming from a tax fraud conviction, authorities said. After stints in southern France and Arizona, Peter M. Sharma, 61, of Tarzana, was arrested last year while living under the assumed name Peter Reynolds, according to the U.S. attorney's office. The attorney for Sharma could not be reached for comment.

A former envoy for Afghanistan's deposed Taliban leadership who pleaded guilty to cheating on his taxes and lying on a bank loan application has been sentenced to two months behind bars. Noorullah Zadran, once a top spokesman for the Taliban in the United States, pleaded guilty June 17 to federal charges in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. Zadran also was fined $5,000 on Tuesday and ordered to serve three years of supervised release, the Justice Department said.

The IRS has charged a Petaluma lumber tycoon with dodging the tax man. Lee Nobmann, the 53-year-old chief executive of Golden State Lumber, was charged in federal court in San Francisco on Tuesday with understating his personal and business incomes and those of several family members for 1996 through 2000. Nobmann pleaded not guilty to five counts of tax evasion and 12 counts of aiding and abetting the preparation of false tax returns for others. A hearing is set for Nov. 4.

An IRS agent whose job entailed conducting audits of taxpayers agreed to plead guilty Monday to a federal charge of cheating on his own taxes, authorities said. Jim H. Liu, 43, of Diamond Bar signed court papers admitting that he filed a false tax return for 2002 that cheated the government out of nearly $15,000, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles. According to a plea agreement filed in U.S.

A federal judge declined Tuesday to grant separate trials for 18 people charged in a tax shelter scheme for the rich that the government has called the largest criminal tax fraud case in history. U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan said much of the evidence supporting the 46-count indictment that charges the defendants with conspiring to defraud the Internal Revenue Service would be used against all of the defendants.

Federal authorities say a Portland man has been indicted in the nation's first case of income tax fraud involving electronic filing of tax returns. Donald J. Penrod, 42, is accused in a 12-count indictment of fraudulently applying for tax refunds under false names through a professional tax-return preparer in Vancouver, Wash. The preparer was not charged. A federal grand jury in Portland returned the indictment Thursday.