North Carolina tax preparer sentenced to prison; prepared more than $5 million in false refund claims

Date: July 7, 2022

Contact: newsroom@ci.irs.gov

A North Carolina man was sentenced today to 15 months in prison for preparing false trust tax returns on behalf of his Washington, D.C.-based and other clients.

According to court documents and statements made in court, Thy Muhammad owned and operated Seventh Millennium International, a Rocky Mount, North Carolina, tax preparation business. In 2013 and 2014, Muhammad prepared fraudulent trust tax returns for clients, falsely reporting that the clients had paid taxes in the name of purported trusts. One such false return resulted in the IRS issuing a refund check of more than $500,000, of which Muhammad took nearly $78,000 as a preparation "fee." During these two years, Muhammad claimed a total of more than $5 million in fraudulent refunds from the IRS that his clients were not entitled to receive.

In addition to the term of imprisonment, U.S. District Judge Randolph D. Moss of the District of Columbia ordered Muhammad to serve three years of supervised release and pay $669,000 in restitution.

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department's Tax Division made the announcement.

IRS-Criminal Investigation investigated the case.

Trial Attorneys Jeffrey McLellan and George Meggali, and former Trial Attorney Abigail Burger Chingos, of the Tax Division prosecuted the case.