A federal grand jury sitting in Montgomery, Alabama returned an indictment, which was unsealed, charging a Phenix City, Alabama resident with conspiring to file fraudulent refund claims, mail fraud, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, announced Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and Acting U.S. Attorney A. Clark Morris for the Middle District of Alabama.
According to the indictment, between November 2010 and December 2013, Anthony Gosha aka Boo Boo, and his co-conspirators used stolen IDs to file over 7,000 tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) seeking more than $19 million in fraudulent refunds. The indictment alleges that Gosha obtained IDs of inmates from the Alabama Department of Corrections and that his co-conspirators obtained IDs from multiple sources, including an Alabama state agency. The indictment charges that they used these IDs to file the fraudulent tax returns. Gosha and his co-conspirators also allegedly obtained several Electronic Filing Identification Numbers in the names of sham tax preparation businesses in order to file the fraudulent returns and apply for tax refund-related bank products from financial institutions.
Read more from the Department of Justice. An indictment merely alleges that crimes have been committed. A defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.