ATLANTA BUSINESSMAN PLEADS GUILTY TO TAX FRAUD CHARGES

Defendant Hid Business Income In Offshore Account

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Eileen J. O’Connor, Assistant Attorney General for the Tax Division, U.S. Department of Justice; Daniel G. Bogden, U.S. Attorney for the District of Nevada; and Nancy Jardini, Chief, IRS Criminal Investigation, announced late yesterday that at the federal courthouse in Reno, Nevada, Robert F. Holliday pled guilty to a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States by impeding the Internal Revenue Service (18 U.S.C. § 371).

Mr. Holliday faces a maximum potential sentence of five years imprisonment followed by up to three years supervised release, a $250,000 fine, and liability for the costs of prosecution. U.S. District Judge David W. Hagen scheduled sentencing for January 18, 2005.

“People who try to reduce or eliminate their tax liabilities by hiding their income and assets from the IRS are on a sure path to trouble,” said Assistant Attorney General Eileen J. O’Connor. “They risk criminal prosecution by the Department of Justice and a lengthy stay in federal prison. And they will still owe the taxes, plus interest, and penalties.”

“The government will not tolerate abusive tax schemes that promote the use of offshore accounts to illegally escape taxes,” stated Nancy Jardini, Chief, IRS Criminal Investigation. “Tax evasion is not a victimless crime. The honest, hardworking American taxpayer pays the price for these scams against the government.”

Mr. Holliday admitted in his plea agreement that he sought assistance from financial consultant Lawrence Turpen to illegally evade the assessment and collection of his income taxes. Messrs. Holliday and Turpen set up domestic and offshore corporations. They used sham transactions to hide income in the offshore entity and create fictitious business expenses, which were used to reduce or eliminate the corporate tax liabilities of the domestic entity. Mr. Holliday gave his tax return preparer the false information. Based in part upon this false information, false corporate income tax returns were prepared for the tax years 1996 through 2002, resulting in a total tax loss of more than $200,000. Mr. Holliday repatriated the untaxed money from his offshore corporation through bogus loans.

Mr. Turpen pled guilty to a charge of conspiracy on July 14, 2004. He is scheduled to be sentenced on October 18, 2004.

Assistant Attorney General O’Connor thanked Tax Division trial attorneys Caryn D. Mark and Edmund P. Power, who prosecuted the case. She also thanked the special agents of Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division, whose assistance was essential to the successful investigation and prosecution of the case.

Additional information about the Justice Department’s Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found at http://www.usdoj.gov/tax.

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