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April 6, 2004
The United States Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California announced that Daren M. Lasky, of Oakley, pleaded guilty today to four counts of tax evasion in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7201.
Mr. Lasky, age 34 and a resident of Oakley, California, was charged by the United States Attorney in an information filed on March 4, 2004, with four counts of tax evasion in violation of Title 26 U.S.C. § 7201 and five counts of adding and assisting in the filing of false returns in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(2).
According to the plea agreement and the information, Mr. Lasky is an independent flooring contractor residing in Oakley, California. He did independent contractor work for many businesses in the Bay Area during the years of 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001. Mr. Lasky received checks from these businesses and although he knew he was required to file tax returns reporting the income he earned and to pay taxes on that income, he admitted he intentionally did not file tax returns reporting the income or pay taxes on this income to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for the 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001 tax years.
In pleading guilty, Mr. Laskey admitted to concealing his income from the IRS by arranging for his compensation from the services provided to general contractors to be falsely reported by them to the IRS on Form 1099-MISC as paid, not to him, but to non-existent corporations with Employer Identification Numbers which were assigned to others by the Internal Revenue Service. The false business names that he used included Commercial Flooring, Inc. and Showers, Tubs, Designs and Flooring, Inc. (STDF, Inc.). In order to conceal his income and assets from the IRS, he used bank accounts opened in other names instead of using his own name or his Social Security Number, so the bank would not report his activities to the IRS.
In addition, Mr. Laskey admitted to knowing he was required to report and pay his true and correct tax liabilities for the 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001 tax years. He admitted his true and correct tax liabilities for those years were as follows: $76,104 for 1998; $1,389 for 1999; $34,335 for 2000; and $53,978 for 2001. He knew he should have reported these amounts as due and owing on federal income tax returns for those years and paid those amounts to the IRS. Despite this knowledge, he did not file 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001 tax returns to evade his true and correct tax liabilities.
Under the plea agreement, Mr. Lasky admitted that he had in excess of $480,000 in income from his flooring business from 1998 through 2001. He was aware that he had a legal duty to file tax returns for those years and pay taxes for each of those years.
The sentencing of Mr. Lasky is scheduled for July 27, 2004, before U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong in Oakland. The maximum statutory penalty for violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7201 is five years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a fine of $250,000. However, the actual sentence will be dictated by the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which take into account a number of factors, and will be imposed in the discretion of the Court. In addition to the term of imprisonment to be determined by the Court, Mr. Lasky will be fined $4,000 and will pay restitution in the amount of $165,806, plus accruing statutory interest, to the United States of America
The investigation is the result of an investigation by the Department of Treasury, Internal Revenue Service. Thomas Moore is the Assistant U.S. Attorney who is prosecuting the case.
All press inquiries to the U.S. Attorney's Office should be directed to Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew J. Jacobs at (415) 436-7181.
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