A Las Vegas businesswoman is headed to federal prison after admitting she helped orchestrate a COVID-era tax scheme that tried to squeeze more than $15 million out of the government, federal prosecutors said.
The case centers on refundable employee retention and paid sick-and-family-leave tax credits that investigators say were claimed on dozens of sham employment-tax returns.
The defendant, Adonia Stiles, pleaded guilty in April to one count of conspiracy to file false claims, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Nevada. Prosecutors say Stiles, a Las Vegas real estate agent, tax preparer and clothing-store owner, directed others to file bogus employment-tax returns and steered clients to a preparer who would submit false refund claims on their behalf.
In a post on X dated July 15, 2026, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced that Stiles had been sentenced and publicly thanked federal partners for the investigation. The post tagged IRS Criminal Investigation and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration as key players in the probe.
How the scheme worked
According to IRS Criminal Investigation, Stiles referred at least 18 people to tax preparer Candies Goode-McCoy. Investigators say Goode-McCoy then filed dozens of fraudulent employment-tax returns in this case, and in related prosecutions, hundreds of returns overall.
The IRS says Goode-McCoy claimed roughly $15 million in refundable COVID-era credits on behalf of those taxpayers, and that the U.S. Treasury actually paid out more than $7 million in improper refunds. Stiles allegedly collected at least $135,000 in referral fees as the money flowed.
The agency reports that many of the filings were propped up with bogus payroll records and fabricated employer-employee relationships, all designed to qualify for credits that were meant to help businesses keep real workers on the books during the pandemic.
Wider enforcement in Nevada
Federal prosecutors say the Stiles case is part of a broader crackdown on pandemic-era tax fraud in Nevada, not a one-off outlier. The Department of Justice recently secured a 54-month sentence in a related prosecution that involved schemes seeking nearly $100 million in credits, a signal that courts in the district are taking these cases seriously.
What’s next
Stiles pleaded guilty to conspiracy to file false claims, an offense that carries a statutory maximum of 10 years in prison, although the actual sentence is set by a judge after weighing the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other factors.
The case was prosecuted by trial attorneys from the Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Nevada, with investigative assistance from IRS Criminal Investigation and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, according to IRS Criminal Investigation.
