Mehef Bey, who went by the alias Arthur Daniels, traveled the country recruiting people to file bogus tax returns seeking hundreds of thousands of dollars in refunds from the Internal Revenue Service, according to federal prosecutors. He succeeding in recruiting at least 200 clients from 19 states, according to the government. Now he’s facing prison. Bey pleaded guilty on Monday, Jan. 3 to charges of conspiring to defraud the government and filing false tax returns. He is the fourth person charged in this scheme to plead guilty. Bey was one of the primary speakers at the tax seminars and he and others involved told prospective clients the IRS owed them money in the form of tax refunds on their mortgages and other debts, the government said.
Backstrom ultimately chose which clients would be permitted to participate, prosecutors said, and he and Bey provided instructions to other co-conspirators regarding what documents were needed. They reportedly collected names, social security numbers and addresses, often referred to as “intake” information, to file fake 1099-MISC forms, which are typically used to report forms of miscellaneous income.
Bey and his fellow conspirators filed the forms through online tax form preparation companies and made it look as if they had been prepared by financial institutions, prosecutors said.
Bey kept track of payments and what was owed to so-called subpromoters working under him and Iran Backstrom, also known as Shariyf Noble, from Milledgeville, Georgia.
The fraud lasted from 2014 to 2016, during which time Bey is accused of helping to submit requests for refunds totaling $64 million — about $38.5 million of which was doled out.
Under the terms of the plea agreement, Bey will pay more than $38 million in restitution and be permanently barred from preparing or assisting in the preparation of any federal tax returns for anyone other than himself.
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