I’m a resident of Las Vegas, so things that help the local economy are generally good. Of course, I have a bias: A good Nevada economy will help keep taxes down. Richard Tatum, Jr. of Houston helped the Las Vegas economy so I suppose I should be thankful for him. The Internal Revenue Service and the US Department of Justice have a different view.
Mr. Tatum owned an industrial staffing business. It was a large business, with about a thousand individuals working for it both internally and at other businesses. Between March 2008 and the end of 2012 the business withheld $12 million in payroll taxes. And there were $6 million of social security and Medicare taxes (the employer’s share) during the same period. However, those funds didn’t make it to the IRS. The good news is that some if helped my local economy: “[Tatum] used the money for his personal benefit, including making payments on his ranch and traveling to Las Vegas, Hawaii and France. Tatum admitted that he caused a tax loss of more than $18 million.”
As I’ve said in the past many times, if you want to go to ClubFed one of the easiest ways is to withhold trust fund (employment) taxes and not remit them. Mr. Tatum will have three years at ClubFed to think things over after pleading guilty to one count of failing to pay over employment taxes; he’ll also have to make restitution of $18,298,604. As usual, it’s a lot easier to simply pay your taxes in the first place….