Tax Fraud Blotter: Bunch of gems
The big clean up; turning down the volume; it’s a killing; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
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Greenwich Connecticut: Exec Jeffrey Arsenault, 63, has pleaded guilty to tax evasion.
Arsenault was the managing member and majority owner of Old Greenwich Capital Advisors, the investment manager of Old Greenwich Capital Partners, a private equity fund of funds. From 2013 through 2022, the latter received investment distributions of at least $9.1 million, which should have been distributed to investors, reinvested or used to pay authorized expenses. Instead, Arsenault used some $5.2 million of the money for personal or other unauthorized expenses, including payments for college tuition and golf club dues.
From 2019 through 2022, Arsenault also received approximately $2.2 million in net income for performing consulting services for third-party investment firms. Although he knew that he was entitled to only 70% of the net income based on his partnership agreement, he kept all of it and used that money for personal expenses.
From 2013 to 2016, Arsenault failed to report all his income on his individual federal income tax returns, resulting in a tax bill of some $1,160,161. From 2017 through 2022, Arsenault failed to file any individual tax returns, resulting in total tax due of some $1,002,709.
As part of his scheme, from 2017 to 2020 Arsenault booked false intercompany loans to conceal his theft that caused the Old Greenwich companies to file false 1065 and provide Arsenault false K-1s. From 2019 to 2022, Arsenault mischaracterized and concealed from his accountants the financial activity, including deposits and wire transfers into his personal bank account, which caused them to prepare false accounting records and returns.
Arsenault agreed to pay $2,162,870 in restitution to the IRS. He has also agreed to pay restitution of $4,668,523.75 to victims in a related civil case.
Tax evasion carries a maximum of five years.
East Lyme, Connecticut: Business operator Analia Mountzoures, 49, has been sentenced to three years of probation for a tax offense.
Mountzoures operated Mountzoures Cleaning, with some 10 employees to provide cleaning services to more than 200 commercial and residential clients in southeastern Connecticut. During the 2018 through 2023 tax years, Mountzoures often paid her employees in cash; did not report their wages to the state or federal government; file required IRS forms related to her employees; issue W-2s; withhold employee taxes; or pay federal employment taxes and withholding.
She also provided her tax preparer with false information that resulted in personal returns that significantly underreported her gross receipts, income and taxes due.
Mountzoures, who previously pleaded guilty, was also ordered to pay $380,167.60 in restitution to the IRS.
Vancouver, Washington: Tax preparer Keith Altamirano, 52, has been sentenced to 18 months in prison for 16 counts of aiding and assisting in the preparation of false and fraudulent returns, to be followed by a 135-month concurrent sentence for his convictions on a state attempted murder charge.
Altamirano operated Integrity Investments, d.b.a. “Servicios Latinos.” Between 2017 and 2021, Altamirano, what authorities termed a “high-volume” preparer, prepared at least 12,000 returns. Statistical sampling analysis reveals that his false entries on returns cost the U.S. Treasury more than $5 million.
He falsified clients’ income tax returns with fake medical expenses and charitable donations, fake cars for depreciation and expense deductions, and fabricated and inflated business expenses. Altamirano also concealed his fraud by omitting his name on his clients’ returns; the clients did not know Altamirano falsified their return to get them a larger refund; the fraud helped build his business as clients recommended him to others to get larger refunds.
The tax loss for the 16 counts he pleaded guilty to is $104,518. Altamirano, who previously pleaded guilty, agreed to pay that amount in restitution to the IRS and was also ordered to sell one of the four properties he owns to pay it.
In September 2025, Altamirano also pled guilty to attempted second-degree murder and drug charges in Clark County Superior Court. Altamirano was sentenced to 135 months of imprisonment in his state case, which will run concurrently with his federal sentence.
Tampa, Florida: Tax preparer George Tucker Jr. has been sentenced to seven years and six months in prison for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aiding and assisting in the filing of false and fraudulent returns.
Beginning in March 2021, and continuing through February 2024, Tucker, who previously pleaded guilty, schemed to defraud the IRS by preparing or helping prepare 316 false and fraudulent returns for 196 taxpayers, including himself, for tax years 2020 to 2023. The returns contained false Schedules A, B, 1 and 3, as well as fraudulent W-2Gs.
The phony returns requested substantial refunds from the IRS that the taxpayers were not legally entitled to. The total intended tax loss from the returns Tucker prepared was $59,941,751. The actual loss totaled $15,028,309.89, which the IRS paid out to taxpayers, including Tucker, either as refunds or credits applied to prior debts. Tucker personally pocketed $1,354,757.64 in the form of payments from his taxpayer-clients or refunds he received directly from the IRS. Tucker used the fraud proceeds to enrich himself, including by buying expensive jewelry.
The court also entered an order of forfeiture in the amount of $1,354,757.64, the proceeds of the criminal conduct and restitution of $15,028,309.89 to the IRS. Tucker entered a guilty plea on Dec. 2, 2024.
