Two sisters charged with filing fraudulent tax returns for clients of their Tarrant firm

Published 3:13 pm Wednesday, April 9, 2014

A federal grand jury has indicted two women on charges of filing fraudulent tax returns on behalf of clients of their Tarrant tax-preparation firm.

U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance White announced that Lugenia L. “Gigi” Conner, 31, of Trussville, and Kaneshia L. “Kiki” Conner-Goodgame, 34, of Birmingham were indicted in late March on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States by obstructing and defeating collection of income taxes by the Internal Revenue Service.

The indictment also individually charges both sisters with assisting in the preparation and presentation of false and fraudulent returns for the 2008 tax year, and with making and filing false returns for themselves for 2008. The indictment was sealed until both women were arrested.

Peggy Sanford, a spokesperson for White’s office, said in a statement that the sisters jointly owned and operated Taxes N More in Tarrant, where they worked together to obtain inflated refunds for their clients in 2009 by falsifying information submitted on clients’ 2008 returns.

The indictment claims that the sisters claimed the First Time Home Buyer’s Credit of up to $7,900 on returns they prepared for other taxpayers, knowing those taxpayers were not entitled to the credit. The women also prepared third-party tax returns claiming itemized deductions or business expenses that clients neither had provided information for, nor were entitled to receive.

Conner faces five counts of assisting in the preparation of fraudulent returns for falsely claiming a total of $93,683 in deductions and credits on returns she prepared for five different taxpayers. Conner-Goodgame faces two counts of the same charge for falsely claiming a total of $15,400 with the First Time Home Buyer’s Credit for two tax clients.

The sisters are also each are charged with creating and submitting 2008 personal tax returns on which they claimed the homebuyers’ credit, knowing they were not entitled to that deduction.

The Taxes N More business had a dramatic increase in both the number of returns prepared and the amount of refunds claimed from the 2007 to the 2008 tax year, according to the indictment. For the 2007 tax year, it says the sisters’ business prepared 337 third-party tax returns, claiming $1.3 million in refunds. For the 2008 tax year, Taxes N More prepared 670 third-party returns, claiming $3.5 million in refunds.

An indictment is only a charge and defendants are presumed innocent. No hearing date has been set.