Improper personal expenses; satisfied clients; unpaid principal; and other highlights of recent tax cases.
Columbus, Georgia: Four Columbus, Georgia, men are heading to federal prison after pleading guilty to mail fraud in a pandemic-era tax scheme that grew far beyond their own business filings. Federal investigators calculated the combined attempted and actual loss to taxpayers at $17,489,749.80. Christopher Upshaw, Johnathon Swift, Dontavis Williams and Donterious Sparks were sentenced August 5. Their prison terms range from three years and five months to nine years and seven months, and each was ordered to repay money obtained through the scheme.The case centered on false Form 941 filings seeking COVID-related tax credits for businesses that investigators said did not have the employees or qualifying wages claimed on the returns.
The men later expanded the operation by filing returns for other people in exchange for a percentage of the refunds.
Upshaw registered DOPE! Apparel, with the Georgia Secretary of State's office in June 2022. On April 29, 2023, he filed five false tax returns seeking COVID-related credits intended to help qualifying employers retain workers and cover certain paid sick and family leave wages.
The IRS issued five refunds to the business totaling $411,112.21. Investigators found no W-2s filed for Upshaw from 2019 through 2023. Georgia Department of Labor records also showed no evidence that DOPE! Apparel employed workers or paid the qualified wages and sick or family leave amounts claimed on the filings.
Upshaw cashed the refund checks and used some of the money to purchase a luxury vehicle, according to federal prosecutors. Swift, Williams and Sparks similarly used LLCs registered in their names to file false returns claiming COVID-related tax credits to which they were not entitled.
Swift obtained $417,095.56 through the false filings, while Williams received $156,531.74 and Sparks received $311,072.55. Combined with Upshaw's $411,112.21, the four defendants received 16 checks totaling $1,295,812.06.
The checks were either cashed or deposited into bank accounts controlled by the defendants.
The defendants recruited other participants and electronically filed tax returns for them in exchange for a percentage of the resulting refunds. They also helped some participants establish limited liability companies and obtain employer identification numbers.
Federal authorities said the defendants submitted more than 150 Form 941 returns for other people. Those filings generated another $15,239,326.17 in combined attempted and actual losses.
Adding that amount to the losses associated with the defendants' own businesses brought the total attempted and actual loss to federal taxpayers to $17,489,749.80.
Williams received the longest sentence at nine years and seven months. He was also sentenced to five years of supervised release and ordered to pay $156,531.74 in restitution.
Upshaw received eight years, followed by five years of supervised release. His restitution obligation is $411,112.21. Swift was sentenced to five years and three months, in prison and five years of supervised release. He must pay $417,095.56 in restitution.
Sparks received three years and five months, followed by five years of supervised release. He was ordered to repay $311,072.55. Together, the restitution orders total $1,295,812.06, matching the amount the four defendants received through the 16 refund checks tied directly to their businesses.
Swift, Williams and Sparks pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud. Upshaw pleaded guilty to the same offense.
Thousand Oaks, California: A Thousand Oaks tax preparer was sentenced to 27 months in federal prison for filing more than 1,700 false tax returns for her clients.
Ann Quach, 50, was also ordered to pay $6.5 million in restitution.
Quach pleaded guilty to one count of aiding in the preparation of false tax returns for the clients of her business, AQ Financial, also known as A2Z Tax Solutions. She also pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud.
From 2011 to 2024, Quach prepared 1,734 Form 1040 returns resulting in multimillion-dollar losses to the U.S. Treasury.
Quach included made-up losses for fake businesses that didn't exist and used those fictitious losses to offset her client's income. She also frequently included false deductions for medical expenses and charitable contributions. The false entries on the tax returns fraudulently reduced the taxes her clients owed — often generating refunds.
Quach collected substantial fees from her satisfied clients, many of whom returned year after year.
Fresno, California: Suliana Caldwell, 46, of Fresno, was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison for stealing over $1.8 million in public funds from the Fresno Arts Council.
Caldwell was the FAC's operations manager from 2021 to February 2026. In this position, she managed the FAC's bank accounts, payroll, grants, donations and general finances. Her duties also included providing periodic financial updates and reports to the executive director, board members and the City and County of Fresno.
Beginning in 2022, Caldwell embezzled funds by making unauthorized withdrawals of money from the FAC's bank accounts. In 2023, after the Fresno City Council designated the council to administer its Measure P grant money, Caldwell significantly increased the amount of money she stole from the FAC's accounts and ultimately took more than $80,000 per month on average. Measure P is a tax initiative to provide funding for parks, trails and the arts.
Caldwell concealed her theft by using her position of trust as the operations manager to falsify financial reports, which omitted her theft and represented that there were significantly higher balances in the council's bank accounts than was true. She then presented the false reports to the FAC's executive director, board members and others to trick them into believing everything was OK. Caldwell received an enhancement to her sentence because of this abuse of trust.
In total, Caldwell stole over $1.8 million from the FAC. She then used the money to gamble at local casinos where she enjoyed various VIP statuses, and to pay for vacations and for other improper personal expenses.
The FAC detected Caldwell's theft in February 2026 when one of its checks bounced. Caldwell was subsequently fired and charged in this case.
Philadelphia: Daryl F. Heller, 56, of Lititz, Pennsylvania, pleaded guilty to securities fraud.
Heller was charged with a fraudulent investment scheme that resulted in investor losses of approximately $402 million.
Heller was the majority owner of several companies based in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, including Paramount Management Group, which purchased, installed, operated, maintained and processed transactions for ATMs and cryptocurrency teller machines (or BTMs) in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and throughout the country.
Heller also controlled and was the majority owner of Heller Capital Group and Prestige Investment Group. Prestige was the majority owner of four companies, collectively, the Prestige Management Companies. Prestige managed the operations of the Prestige and WF Velocity ATM Funds.
From about January 2017 to December 2024, Heller solicited, and caused others to solicit, approximately $770 million from investors in the Prestige and WF Velocity ATM Funds, based on materially false and fraudulent pretenses, representations and promises, including that the money they invested would be used by Paramount to purchase and operate ATMs and BTMs on behalf of the investors, and that investors would receive monthly payments for a period of approximately six to seven years, and those monthly payments would be funded through the operation of the ATMs and BTMs that the investors purportedly purchased from Paramount.
A substantial amount of the funds was obtained as promised, but used instead to pay the monthly payments owed to earlier investors in the Prestige and WF Velocity ATM Funds, other ATM and BTM investors, Heller's personal expenses and business debts incurred by Paramount and other companies that Heller owned and controlled.
To carry out the scheme, Heller created false and fraudulent records, which grossly misrepresented the number of ATMs and BTMs in Paramount's network and grossly overstated the revenues being generated by those ATMs and BTMs. Those documents were used to satisfy existing investors, solicit new investors and deceive others.
In or about April 2024, Heller caused Paramount to stop making monthly payments to investors after the Prestige and WF Velocity ATM Funds stopped providing substantial amounts of new investor money to Paramount. Investors have not received any payments since April 2024, despite Heller's promises from April 2024 to December 2024 to make payments and to buy out the investors.
Paramount went out of business in or about December 2024, and investors in the Prestige and WF Velocity ATM Funds have unpaid principal amounts totaling approximately $402 million.
Heller is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 1 and faces a maximum possible sentence of 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release and a $5 million fine. Restitution in an amount to be determined by the court will also be ordered. Forfeiture of all proceeds from the offense, in an amount to be determined by the Court, also may be ordered.
