$30 million DC tax scam; third world-sized scandal

Democrats want to get a voting seat in Congress for the District of Columbia, but every month, a new scandal erupts in the District’s government. Scandals that are more in line with third world nations than with here in the United States. This month’s scandal is in the DC Office of Tax and Revenue (Washington Post link);

Federal authorities initially said the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue had lost more than $16 million in a brazen refund scam orchestrated by a mid-level manager. They later upped the figure to $20 million and warned that the damage could be even higher as their investigation continues. Yesterday, law enforcement sources confirmed that taxpayer losses could reach $30 million or more.

The Post’s analysis showed that the volume and pace of suspicious activity at the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue reached its peak in the past three years. Of all real estate tax refunds issued in that span, about half appeared suspicious.

And of the $37 million refunded from the start of 2005 to July 2007, the dubious checks total more than $19 million.

Harriette Walters, the former manager in charge of property tax refunds, was arrested Nov. 7 and is charged with signing off on payments to sham companies controlled by family members and others who were in on the scheme. Six people have been charged, including tax employee Diane Gustus, one of several city workers who prepared or handled paperwork leading to the checks.

The Washington Examiner describes Walters’ first day in court, yesterday;

The woman charged with being the mastermind of the largest corruption scandal in the history of the District of Columbia had a plan to escape to the Caribbean and confessed her role in the scam when caught, prosecutors said in court Tuesday.

 

Citing the “sheer magnitude” of the allegations against former D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue manager Harriette Walters, U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Kay ordered her held indefinitely. Federal prosecutors had argued that the $20 million identified in the probe may be only a fraction of the amount she stole.

Walters and her ex-colleague, Diane Gustus, stand accused of pilfering tens of millions of dollars from the public in an elaborate fraud conspiracy that cooked up six-figure payments to dummy companies and financed lavish lifestyles that included homes in the Caribbean, multimillion-dollar Nieman Marcus shopping sprees and garages full of high-priced cars from Corvette and Bentley.

Walters, wearing an oversized denim jacket and with her blond-dyed dreadlocks tied away from her face, spoke softly but clearly in Tuesday’s hearing, answering questions in short, declarative sentences. Authorities acknowledged in court filings that it is unusual for a white-collar criminal defendant to be held without bond, but U.S. Attorney Timothy Lynch said that Walters was “a highly sophisticated offender.”

This is the kind of corruption you usually read about in banana republics south of us, not in the United States – but it’s indicative of the way the DC government treats it’s citizens – and the money they get from the federal government to operate our local third world government surrounding the nation’s Capitol.

Just a few years ago, the head of the DC teachers’ union pension fund was busted for stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the fund and then flaunting her new cash flow in public with a chauffer and a limo while draped in furs.

Recently, a sex offender was found to be a principal at a district shool. 

A former fire chief was hired from Augusta, Ga. while he was in the midst of a criminal investigation there, after less than a year in DC, he was caught pilfering fire-fighting funds – surprise!

DC voters continue to send that criminal racebaiting Marion Berry, crackhead whore monger to elected office. DC city government is rife with corruption and failures, yet we should give them a seat a Congress so they can spread their corrut reach throughout the country?

Sometimes I feel sorry for Adrian Fenty, DC’s new mayor, because he seems like a decent guy trying to do the right thing for DC, but the voters are too damn stupid to show him any appreciation. DC voters deserve a crackhead whoremonger mayor. 

Gaius at Blue Crab Boulevard wonders when the scandal starts being “material”.

Category: Politics