Joshua Doubek
Have you ever wondered how Internal Revenue Service employees make ends meet on those skimpy federal salaries? What with the competing demands of mortgages, feeding the kids, and those damned cable television bills, life can be expensive, so how to keep your head above water…?
I know—unemployment fraud!
According to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration:
Ten former Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employees were sentenced in the Western District of Missouri between January 26, 2015, and January 28, 2015, for the theft of Government property stemming from unemployment benefits fraud… The individuals were required to certify weekly, via the Internet or telephone, any work and earnings in order for [Missouri Division of Employment Security] to determine the validity of continued benefits. All 10 of the defendants were employed at the IRS while claiming unemployment benefits through MODES, resulting in the fraudulent payment of benefits in amounts ranging from $6,127 to $21,348, with an aggregate total of $112,609.
All 10 entered guilty pleas and are now on probation for five to 10 years over what amounts to a pretty pissant sum. Really, if you're going to steal, steal big.
There's no indication from the Inspector General's telling that the IRS employees were anything but entirely honest and aboveboard in their handling of the taxpayers' business. So rest assured.
But maybe the same can't be said of Yolanda Castro, who put her hard-earned tax examination skills to creative use.
Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employee Yolanda Castro was arrested on February 27, 2015, [1] for making false Federal tax returns. Castro was indicted in the Eastern District of California the previous day, February 26, 2015, on charges of making a fraudulent tax return by an employee of the United States, aiding and assisting fraud and false statements, and false statements to a Government agency. [2] According to court documents, Castro has been employed by the IRS in Fresno, California, for approximately 20 years as a tax examiner and, most recently, as a contact representative responsible for responding to taxpayers' inquiries and making adjustments to taxpayers' accounts. [3] Between 2007 and 2013, Castro prepared and filed, or caused to be filed, numerous fraudulent Federal income tax returns for herself, her family members, and others, on which she knowingly placed false information for purported child care services, education expenses, business expenses, and casualty losses. As a result of her fraudulent conduct, Castro defrauded the United States of approximately $37,387.
Castro also prepared bogus returns for other people and "illicitly accessed IRS databases." But I'm having a hard time getting past that 37 grand over six years. With such poor numbers, she'll never make it to the Senate.
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