May 21, 2004

PRESS RELEASE

MASHPEE RESIDENT SENTENCED TO SERVE 33 MONTHS IN
FEDERAL PRISON FOR EVADING OVER $570,000 IN INCOME TAXES

Boston, MA. United States Attorney Michael J. Sullivan; Eileen J. O'Connor, Assistant Attorney General of the Department of Justice's Tax Division; and Joseph A. Galasso, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation, announced that JOHN MIKUTOWICZ, age 53, a resident of Mashpee, Massachusetts was re-sentenced yesterday by U.S. District Judge Rya Zobel to serve 33 months in prison. On June 28, 2002, MIKUTOWICZ was convicted of conspiracy to defraud the United States, 5 counts of filing false Corporate U.S. Income Tax Returns, and 4 counts of Tax Evasion for the years 1995 through 1998 on his Individual U.S. Income Tax Returns.

MIKUTOWICZ originally was sentenced on September 30, 2002, to serve 12 months in prison which represented a downward departure from the U.S. Sentencing Guideline range of 33 to 41 months' imprisonment. The United States appealed the sentence to the First Circuit Court of Appeals, which vacated the sentence and returned the case for re-sentencing. At yesterday's re-sentencing, Judge Zobel added 21 months to MIKOTUWICZ's original 12 month sentence.

At trial, the Government's evidence proved that from 1994 through 1999 MIKUTOWICZ, the owner of AGM Marine ("AGM"), located in Mashpee, Massachusetts, aided by Tower Executive Resources ("Tower"), of Colorado, used shell corporations to divert over $1.3 million of AGM's earnings for 1994 through 1999 to a secret account in the Turks and Caicos Islands. From that account, MIKUTOWICZ then moved the money to yet another private account in the Cayman Islands. During the trial, excerpts of a recording were played in which Tower operators instructed their members on how to make their income "go away." Membership with Tower cost $50,000.

The jury also convicted MIKUTOWICZ of evading taxation on $100,000 of capital gains on the sale of commercial real estate MIKUTOWICZ owned in Sandwich, Massachusetts. MIKUTOWICZ caused PATRA, one of the shell corporations created by Tower, to backdate an option agreement on the Sandwich property which MIKUTOWICZ claimed to have "bought back" with $100,000 of the proceeds from the sale of the Sandwich property, thereby reducing his taxable gain on the sale of the real estate by $100,000. This $100,000 was also diverted to the secret Turks and Caicos account.

"Moving assets offshore or into bogus trusts to hide them from the IRS is a serious crime," said Assistant Attorney General Eileen J. O'Connor. "The substantial prison sentence imposed in this case demonstrates that the Department of Justice and the IRS will aggressively investigate and prosecute such violations of the tax laws."

The case was investigated by Special Agents of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation. It was prosecuted by Corey J. Smith and Robert P. Boyer, Trial Attorneys with the Department of Justice Tax Division.

Press Contact: Samantha Martin, (617) 748-3139