A Houston-based tax preparer has copped to cooking the books, pleading guilty to assisting in the preparation and filing of some seriously bogus income tax returns, the U.S. Attorney's Office said yesterday. Krystal Wright, who ran the shop at WW2F in Freeport for a solid six years, was the only tax guru in-house, handling all matters financial.
According to a release by the U.S. Attorney's Office, Wright's clients were mostly none the wiser, as they held no businesses, nor chatted up about any business income or expenses with her. She played a game of keep-away with the completed tax documents, only letting clients see the refund amount and the returns' first two pages — a move that kept them in the dark about the false or inflated claims she made on their behalf.
From the tax years 2017 through 2020, Wright's creative accounting involved conjuring up about 83 federal income tax returns. The fake filings included everything but the kitchen sink — qualified solar electric property costs, generous gifts by cash or check, imaginary business expenses, and wages that never were. Ultimately, this house of cards cost the government some serious green, tallying up to $525,404 in tax harm.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey V. Brown, overseeing the case, is gearing up to bring down the hammer at the sentencing on June 26. Wright is looking at possibly warming a federal prison bunk for up to three years and could be slapped with a fine of up to $250,000. Having pleaded guilty, she currently awaits her fate in the clink, officials confirmed.
The tax fiasco was sniffed out by IRS Criminal Investigation, with Assistant U.S. Attorneys Rodolfo Ramirez and James Hu spearheading the prosecution. As it stands, Wright's alleged misdeeds will likely leave her facing a hefty price for playing fast and loose with Uncle Sam's purse strings.
