IRS Employee Goes To Jail

A former employee of the Internal Revenue Service will be spending some jail time after collecting refunds of people whose identities he stole.

Sentenced last Thursday to more than 8 years in prison, Mansfield, Texas resident Thomas W. Richardson was also ordered by the court to pay $30, 000 in restitution following his guilty plea August of last year to one count of aggravated identity theft and one count of government property theft.

According to reports, Richardson filed 29 fraudulent income tax returns in the year 2005. The fraudulent returns totaled to almost $8, 000, 000. The returns were filed between April 15^th and 17^th in the year 2006.

The IRS paid all of the refunds with Richardson bagging almost $2, 000, 000.

Man who tried selling his daughter arrested for identity theft

Once arrested for trying to sell his newborn daughter on Craigslist, Jeremy Pete is in the news again but this time its because of identity theft charges.

Pete was slapped with the charges while in custody at a jail in Manitoba. The 29-year-old father is facing 197 counts of identity theft along with other fraudulent charges after authorities found records of personal data belonging to Winnipeg residents in the possession of Pete.

The said list was found when Pete was arrested for drug trafficking –yet another case that Pete is facing.

Police say that the Winnipeg man was on a night flight coming from Vancouver on December 15, 2011 but was stopped by authorities and charged with trafficking GHB and meth. The charges however are still pending and remain unproven, sources say.

Pete was on bail when he got arrested by authorities and his arrest led to an investigation done by commercial crime cops. The said investigation resulted to a warrant issued on January 23^rd, 2012. The authorities, reports say, had to travel to Brandon to arrest Pete who was the formally charged with a number of new crimes just last Wednesday.

The identity theft issue remain unsolved but there is enough circumstantial evidence to prosecute the Winnipeg resident. The cops also seized passports and credit cards belonging to two people – Davor Koval and Geofrrey Strench. They also found the resident card of Raphael Angelo Garcia in Pete’s possession. The police also found a forged Indian status card allegedly made by Pete himself.

This piece of news just shows how important it is for individuals to guard their personal information, one of the policemen from Winnipeg said.

Const. Jason Michalyshen said in an interview that identity theft is an ongoing issue.

If you fear that your identity might have been stolen, it would be best to get a credit report today to make sure that your information is not misused.