Mansion Ends Up Getting Owner in Hot Water for Tax Evasion

Is it possible to hide anything from the IRS? Even when you think you’re safe, it appears the IRS has an eye in the sky. That eye seems to be all reaching, at least in Pennsylvania. A wealthy real estate developer and CEO of Automated Health Systems owns a luxurious 32,400 square-foot mansion that apparently caught the eye of IRS agents flying in and out of Pittsburgh.
After authorities began to ask questions that eventually lead to the mansion owner’s personal secretary ending up in some serious trouble. That’s because the secretary, who also acted as the bookkeeper for her boss, recently pleaded guilty to tax evasion, which reportedly could be as much as $250 million. The mansion owner has not been charged in the case at this point and his attorney claims that the case is nothing more than a tax dispute.
However, the attorney for the secretary claims that his client was only following her boss’ direction and simply did what he directed her to do. He did concede that it was still criminal activity and his client is aware of that. The scheme reportedly involved re-characterizing her boss’ personal expenses to appear as business expenses. Formal charges include “conspiracy to fraudulently pay for and unlawfully deduct as business expenses, millions of dollars in personal expenses of co-conspirator 1.” It would appear that “co-conspirator 1” is her boss, although he has yet to be named.
The lesson here is if you’re going to build a big mansion, make sure it’s nowhere near a major airport, or else the eye in the sky might decide to take a closer look.
The State of the Private Equity Industry—Is It All Down Hill From Here?
In the past private equity has been a solid way of investing taking in trillions of capital, but with the ever changing world we live in, what is the state of the industry? Private equity investments typically consist of money being placed in a company by venture capital firms, private equity firms or angel…
How the Wealthy Save on Taxes
Whether you make minimum wage or you’re in the richest 1 percent of earners, every taxpayer likes to keep as much of his or her hard-earned income as possible. There are hundreds of ways to save on taxes and many of these strategies are universal to all taxpayers no matter which tax bracket they…
How the Internet Became Commercial
What’s Behind the Commercial movement of the Internet? Believe it or not the Internet was not originally created to share your life on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram or to watch movies, play games or follow your favorite pastime. When it was first invented, the military and research universities were the primary…
Critical Decisions When Launching a Startup
There are countless aspects to launching a startup company. To do it successfully a founder has to make many critical decisions and be right on most of them. Many entrepreneurs have a great idea or product with great plans to make it successful. However, they don’t make the right business decisions, which leads to their…