A Lafayette County, Missouri, business owner has pleaded guilty in federal court to failing to pay over nearly $2 million in payroll and employment taxes over a four-year period. Sandra Eller, 59, of Napoleon, Mo., waived her right to a grand jury and pleaded guilty before U.S. Chief District Judge Beth Phillips on charges of failure to truthfully account for and pay over to the IRS the federal income taxes and payroll taxes withheld and owing to the government. Eller has owned and operated three different medical billing and claims processing companies.
By pleading guilty, Eller admitted that she willfully failed to deposit the Federal Insurance Contributions Act and Medicare (FICA) taxes and income taxes that were withheld from her employees’ wages. Eller also admitted that she did not pay the employer portion of FICA. Eller withheld the FICA taxes and income taxes, totaling $939,294, on 18 occasions between 2019 and 2019. Eller withheld payroll taxes from her employees’ paychecks; however, instead of forwarding those taxes to the government, she kept them for her business. Eller also owed the employer’s portion of the FICA taxes, unpaid federal unemployment taxes, employment tax, and state tax withholdings that were not paid over, all of which total $1,051,699.
Eller’s actions resulted in a total tax loss of $1,990,993. Federal statutes dictate that Eller is subject to a sentence of up to five years in federal prison without parole. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.
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