PHOENIX – – The Internal Revenue Service today announced the release of its IRS Criminal Investigation (CI) annual report (https://www.irs.gov/pub/foia/ig/ci/FY2015_IRS-CI_Annual_Report.pdf), which focuses on tax-related identity theft, money laundering, public corruption, cybercrime and terrorist financing, IRS CI initiated 3,853 cases in FY 2015.
“This report reflects the extremely high level of commitment that CI agents bring to the job and the great case work accomplished in the past year,” said Richard Weber, Chief, IRS Criminal Investigation. “But the story that the report tells this year is that fewer agents do mean fewer cases. I’m extremely proud of all that we accomplished in spite of our budget challenges, but the inability to hire is really taking a toll.”
CI is the only federal law enforcement agency with jurisdiction over federal tax crimes.
CI investigates potential criminal violations of the Internal Revenue Code and related financial crimes in a manner to foster confidence in the tax system and compliance with the law. The 50-page report summarizes a wide variety of IRS CI activity throughout the fiscal year and includes case summaries on a range of tax crimes, money laundering, public corruption, terrorist financing and narcotics trafficking financial crimes.
Included in the report is information related to the FIFA investigation, a case that continues to this day. At the time, the investigation involved coordination with police agencies and governments in 33 countries and was one of the most complicated international white-collar cases in recent memory.
The report includes information about Ross Ulbricht, the creator and owner of the “Silk Road” website, who was sentenced to life in prison and ordered to forfeit more than $183 million. The case of a Michigan man, Dr. Farid Fata who was sentenced to 540 months in prison and ordered to forfeit $17 million for his role in a health care fraud scheme, is also included in the report. Fata purposefully misdiagnosed people with cancer, pumping their bodies with chemotherapy that they did not need, in order to get rich.
“I’m proud of IRS-CI and the reputation that this agency has as the best financial investigators in the world. We have a long and storied history and we continue to write new chapters to that history each year,” said Weber. “Regardless of our budget situation, I am proud that we have not lost sight of our impact or mission and that the quality of our cases remains high.”