Gregory A. White, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, announced today that a federal grand jury returned an indictment against Michael W. Murdock and Holly M. Hatch, charging them with conspiracy and making false claims against the United States stemming from a false tax refund scheme operated by Murdock, while incarcerated at the Mansfield Correctional Institution (MANCI), in Mansfield, Ohio. According to court records, Murdock is presently incarcerated at the Southern Ohio Correctional facility in Lucasville, Ohio, and Hatch resides at 686 Westerly Court, Akron, Ohio.

If convicted, each defendant’s sentence will be determined by the Court after review of factors unique to this case, including the defendant’s prior criminal record, if any, the defendant’s role in the offense and the characteristics of the violation. In all cases the sentence will not exceed the statutory maximum and in most cases it will be less than the maximum.

The indictment charges the defendants jointly with conspiring to make false claims, as follows: Murdock obtained the names and Social Security numbers of other MANCI prisoners, without their knowledge, and used the information to prepare fraudulent tax returns in their names, claiming false tax refunds. Each fraudulent return contained a “substitute W-2 form,” purportedly prepared and signed by the claimant, containing fictitious information of purported wages and tax withholdings along with statements of reasons the claimant could not obtain a W-2 form from the employer. In fact, Murdock fabricated the wage and withholding information and forged the claimants’ signatures. Murdock filed 77 such returns with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), claiming refunds of purported tax withholdings totaling $83,778. He also unsuccessfully attempted to place an additional 20 fraudulent returns in the mail addressed to the IRS, containing combined false tax refund claims totaling $20,620. According to the indictment, Hatch’s role in the conspiracy was to rent post office boxes, which Murdock used as the claimants’ addresses on most of the false tax returns (along with some addresses of Murdock’s relatives), and then to receive and negotiate the refund checks and send part of the proceeds to Murdock. Hatch initially rented a post office box in Akron, and later rented a box in Mansfield.

In addition to the conspiracy charge, the indictment separately charges Murdock with five counts of making false claims with regard to five of the false returns filed with the IRS and Hatch with five counts of making false claims by negotiating the resulting refund checks issued by the IRS based on those returns.

The government’s case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney John M. Siegel, following an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation Division, Akron, Ohio.

An indictment is only a charge and is not evidence of guilt. A defendant is entitled to a fair trial in which it will be the government’s burden to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.