Mirna Leticia Duran Gets 2 Years for Tax Fraud Scheme

Mirna Leticia Duran, 39, of Rose Hill, North Carolina, is going to prison for running a brazen tax refund scam that nearly bled the IRS of over $1.4 million. On Monday, in a packed federal courtroom in Raleigh, U.S. District Judge Terrence W. Boyle sentenced Duran to 24 months behind bars, followed by 3 years of supervised release. She’s also been ordered to repay $247,290 in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service.

Duran pleaded guilty on June 27, 2016, to one count of conspiracy to file fraudulent income tax returns using Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers—ITINs—meant for non-citizen workers who legally pay taxes. Instead, Duran and her co-conspirators weaponized the system, attaching fake wage and tax statements to their filings. The scheme relied on phantom dependents, fabricating entire families to inflate child tax credits and trigger massive refunds.

The IRS caught on before the full $1.4 million could be siphoned from federal coffers, blocking many of the fraudulent claims. But Duran still managed to cash in personally—filing a false return in her own name, claiming she earned wages and had taxes withheld from a job that didn’t exist. That single return netted her a $9,409 refund, money she never earned and will now be forced to repay.

This was no solo hustle. The investigation peeled back layers of a broader network using stolen identities and falsified documents to game the tax system. Authorities say Duran coordinated with others to mass-produce bogus returns during filing season, exploiting loopholes and bureaucratic lag times to slip through the cracks—until they didn’t.

The Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation Division led the takedown, working alongside federal and local heavyweights: U.S. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Duplin County Sheriff’s Office. The interagency push underscores how tax fraud has evolved from quiet cheating into organized, high-volume crime.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Susan B. Menzer prosecuted the case for the government, driving home the message that stealing from the tax system carries steep consequences. For Mirna Leticia Duran, that price is two years in federal prison and a financial reckoning that won’t disappear when she walks out of custody.