With a name like Sweeties you can probably guess what the business was in. If the government is correct, your first instinct would be right.
The Department of Justice is accusing Douglas Ketcher and Christina Wypych of Oakland Park, Florida of running a prostitution ring. That in itself is illegal. But not only did they allegedly violate those laws, the 58-count indictment also alleges that the owners did not pay their staff their full wages and, more importantly, didn’t remit their trust fund taxes to the IRS.
As I’ve said repeatedly, a sure-fire way of getting in trouble with the government is to not remit trust fund taxes or somehow get the accounting of those taxes wrong. The IRS investigates nearly 100% of these cases, and if you’re underlying business is shady the last thing you want is to have government investigators knocking on your door.
The indictment of Mr. Ketcher and Ms. Wypych alleges that their business, Sweeties, charged $300 an hour for customers to be “entertained” by their employees. Had they remitted their trust fund taxes they’d likely not be facing money laundering, tax fraud, and prostitution charges.
I always wonder about this behavior. If you’re doing one kind of shady thing, why draw attention to yourself by breaking the law?
On the other hand, maybe they felt like they were already criminals, and might as well put all their eggs in that particular basket.