Seven Springfieldians indicted in tax fraud scheme

Seven Springfield residents were among 13 indicted this week in a conspiracy to obtain over $340,000 from fraudulent income tax returns.

Cherie Christine Dupuis, 42, Claudia Dorsey, 33, Travis Ashmead, 29, Amanda Leigh Boyd, 32, Johnny Cooper, 25, Lisa Lorre Dehaven, 34, and Jeannie Marie Rhodes, 33, all of Springfield, as well as five other Missouri residents and one from Arkansas were charged in a 30-count indictment by a federal grand jury March 31 in Springfield, according to an April 1 news release from the office of Tammy Dickinson, U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.

According to the indictment, 12 of the 13 defendants allegedly conspired to defraud the government by filing false tax returns from February 2009 to March 2012. All of the defendants allegedly filed false claims for income tax refunds, resulting in $340,630 in fraudulent returns.

The indictment alleges the conspirators stole identification information, including names and Social Security numbers, from individuals to file the returns that included fictitious employment information, wages that had not been earned and tax that had not been withheld. Conspirators allegedly shared with each other employer information so they could create fictitious W-2 forms, as well as dependent information that allowed them to false claim dependents on returns, according to the release.

Among allegations, the indictment alleges Dupuis received a $5,135 refund in 2009, a $9,174 refund in 2010, a $9,437 refund in 2011 and a $10,507 refund in 2012, all of them fraudulent. Dupuis also allegedly directed co-conspirators to give her half of their illegal proceeds obtained from fraudulent refunds.

In addition to allegedly filing fraudulent returns for herself and two others, Dorsey allegedly allowed Dupuis to use her laptop to create false tax returns and list her mailing address on returns filed by the defendants, the release said.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Mohlhenrich. It was investigated by IRS-Criminal Investigation.[[In-content Ad]]