Nicholas Laws, Tax Fraud, North Carolina 2021

A North Carolina tax preparer has been brought to justice in a brazen case of tax evasion.

Nicholas Laws, a tax preparer from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, pleaded guilty to aiding and assisting in the preparation of a false tax return and to filing a false personal income tax return.

According to court documents, Laws managed the Winston-Salem branch of Tax Mind, a tax-return preparation business, from 2014 to 2019. During that period, Laws prepared fraudulent returns for clients that reported false wages and business incomes to increase the clients’ refunds.

Laws charged additional fees to prepare false returns, with fees occasionally exceeding $1,000. Laws also filed a false personal income tax return for 2014 and did not file tax returns reporting his income for 2015 through 2019, despite having an obligation to do so.

Laws intended to cause a tax loss to the IRS of $2,934,891. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 20, 2021.

Laws faces a statutory maximum sentence of three years in prison for assisting in the preparation of a false tax return and three years in prison for filing a false personal income tax return, as well as a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.

Laws agreed in his plea agreement to pay restitution to the IRS in the amount of $184,072.

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg and Acting U.S. Attorney Sandra J. Hairston made the announcement.

IRS-Criminal Investigation is investigating the case.

Trial Attorneys Brian Flanagan and Kevin Schneider of the Tax Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Cliff Barrett of the Middle District of North Carolina are prosecuting the case.

Nicholas Laws, aiding and assisting in the preparation of a false tax return and filing a false personal income tax return, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Oct. 20, 2021. Laws faces up to three years in prison per count, as well as supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties. He agreed to pay $184,072 in restitution to the IRS.