Jason Stinson, Tax Return Preparer Fraud, Georgia 2016

A federal court in Orlando, Florida, has permanently barred Jason Stinson, of Longwood, Florida, from preparing federal tax returns for others and from owning or operating a tax return preparation business.

The civil order, signed by Judge Anne C. Conway of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, also requires Stinson to disgorge to the United States $949,952.47 of funds he received from “improper and fraudulent tax return preparation.”

The court determined that Stinson owns a company called “Nation Tax Services” and had stores in four states: Birmingham and Fairfield, Alabama; St. Petersburg and Tampa, Florida; Albany and Augusta, Georgia; and Greenville and Raleigh, North Carolina. Stinson’s stores, the court found, targeted “underprivileged, undereducated poor people and earned income credit claims.”

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a refundable tax credit for working people with low to moderate income. Eligibility depends on factors such as the amount of income, filing status, and the amount of dependents. To illustrate, the court noted that customers with earned income between $13,050 and $17,100 in tax year 2012 could receive the maximum EITC.

The court found that Stinson falsified information on his customers’ returns to claim the maximum EITC amount by: “claiming bogus dependents, fabricating unreimbursed employee expenses and charitable contributions, and fabricating business income and expenses.”

Stinson’s stores charged customers in excess of $600 to prepare a single tax return, even as much as $999, sometimes without telling the customer, the court determined. Moreover, the court found that Stinson’s practice was to take his fees out of his customer’s refund, rather than charge fees upfront.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. Hubbert of the Justice Department’s Tax Division said, “The Tax Division works with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to protect taxpayers from unscrupulous return preparers. Court decisions like this show that those who prepare false tax returns will be stopped and will not profit from their fraudulent conduct.”

The Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of unscrupulous tax preparers in the past decade. Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department’s website. An alphabetical listing of persons enjoined from preparing returns and promoting tax schemes can be found on this page.

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