PHOENIX – A Valley man, Kevin Jeffory Rocheteau, was sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to filing false claims with the Internal Revenue Service while in jail.
Rocheteau recruited Kathie Bonenberger through video calls from a Maricopa County jail facility, to file false claims with the Internal Revenue Service at his direction, beginning in 2016. The duo did this by preparing false federal tax returns and filing these false returns with the IRS.
According to IRS-Criminal Investigations, on the two occasions at the direction of Rocheteau, Bonenberger also received tax refund checks related to the fraudulent returns, endorsed the checks, and deposited the checks into bank accounts that Bonenberger owned and controlled.
Bonenberger at Rocheteau’s direction filed 35 false tax returns and claimed $165,000 in refunds.
Rocheteau directed the use of several techniques in order to falsely inflate the tax refunds, including claiming wages from fake or out-of-business employers, claiming wages on behalf of a person who never worked for a particular employer, and arranging
to send the returns to multiple IRS Service Centers in an effort to conceal the scheme.
“IRS Criminal Investigation has made it a top priority to investigate and recommend prosecution on individuals who think they can steal from the government by filing false tax returns,” said Acting Special Agent in Charge Tara Sullivan. “The result of
this crime is almost always a prison sentence, not an ill-gotten tax refund.”