Tax Preparer Extradited For $10 Million Tax Fraud

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) recently extradited a tax preparer back to Canada from Italy and put her into custody to serve a 10-year sentence for tax fraud after she claimed $58 million in false carrying charges and charitable donations on over 4,000 returns.

According to a news release issued September 8, Doreen Tennina was found guilty in the Superior Court of Justice in Oshawa, Ontario, on May 31 on two counts of fraud over $5,000 under the Criminal Code. She was sentenced in absentia to the maximum period of 10 years in jail on each count to be served concurrently.  Here’s what happened.

The former Vaughan, Ontario, tax preparer fraudulently claimed carrying charges and charitable donations totalling $58,500,000 on 4,200 tax returns from 2003 to 2005, reducing federal taxes owing by over $10 million. She was also ordered to pay a fine of $699,608 for causing her company, Executive Accounting, to fail to report income received from the tax evasion scheme.

It’s a good reminder that taxpayers can avoid penalties, interest and jail by filing correct returns in the first place and by voluntarily complying with the law if there have been errors and omissions in prior filings. More information on the Voluntary Disclosures Program (VDP) can be found on the CRA’s website at www.cra.gc.ca/voluntarydisclosures.