HOUSTON – A Houston woman has been sentenced to 12 years in federal prison following her convictions on seven counts of aiding and assisting in preparing false tax returns, the United States Department of Justice announced Tuesday.
U.S. District Judge David Hittner ordered Cheryl Christin Kissentaner to serve 144 months in federal prison to be immediately followed by one year of supervised release. She was also ordered to pay restitution of $71,180, U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani said.
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At the hearing, the court reportedly heard additional evidence describing Kissentaner’s history of failing to pay her own personal taxes, civil fraud penalties associated with them and penalties for failing to use due diligence in preparing tax returns. Hamdani said the total amount Kissentaner owes to the United States from her criminal and civil cases is in excess of $1.9 million. Investigators said she used some of the money from the scheme to purchase a Bentley and Maserati and for cosmetic surgery.
The court said they also heard about Kissentaner’s violation of her conditions of release and her failure to cooperate with pre-trial services.
“Kissentaner was convicted by a jury for preparing fraudulent tax returns on behalf of her clients and will now spend significant time behind bars,” said Assistant Special Agent-in-Charge Lucy Tan of IRS Criminal Investigation’s (IRS-CI) Houston Field Office. “She criminally abused her role as a tax return preparer and violated the trust that the American taxpayers have bestowed upon her. We all pay our taxes, but when you decide to cheat, remember, we have a 100% conviction rate in our office for criminal tax cases over the past 20 years.”
The jury heard from federal agents as well as five of Kissentaner’s clients at the trial, a news release said. Testimony and evidence revealed individuals paid her to prepare their tax returns from 2016 through 2019 through her company First Financial Tax Services, however, authorities said she was not legally allowed to do so. According to the law, a paid tax preparer is required to have paid all of his or her own tax returns, but Kissentaner reportedly didn’t pay her 2012-2017 tax returns until late 2019. This was after the tax returns she prepared and filed for a fee, investigators said.
From 2016 through 2019, authorities said Kissentaner prepared at least nine tax returns in which she created fake businesses that allegedly operated at losses. They also claimed false fuel tax credits, state income tax deductions for Texas residents (who did not pay a state income tax), false medical expenses, unemployed reimbursement expenses, false contributions to charity, other false expenses for businesses and failed to report IRA distributions, Hamdani said.
Investigators said Kissentaner also claimed that she owed no duty to examine their returns for fake claims.
“However, Kissentaner filed numerous certificates under oath with the IRS in which she promised the government she would exercise due diligence in examining the tax returns she prepared and filed,” the release said.
Kissentaner allegedly charged tax preparer fees in excess of other firms that provided the same services and asked potential clients to identify a reference and offered them a fee if they referred people themselves.
During the trial, Hamdani said evidence showed that 98% of Kissentaner’s clients received a refund even though several of them owed as much as $25,000 and did not pay any income taxes throughout the year. One client had allegedly been obtaining a refund in excess of $8,000 each year. After Kissentaner became aware that she was under investigation, that client was informed she owed over $10,000, investigators said.
“When she inquired as to the change, Kissentaner untruthfully claimed that it was due to a change in the tax law and due to the client’s son now attending college on a full-time basis,” the release said.
Investigators said a lot of Kissentaner’s clients claimed fuel tax credits despite the fact that only 0.2% of all taxpayers would be eligible for the benefit.
Kissentaner has been and will remain in custody pending transfer to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near future.
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