SANTA ANA — The owner of a Westminster tax preparation business was sentenced Monday to 41 months in federal prison for his role in a scheme orchestrated by a corrupt social worker who stole clients’ identities in order to illegally obtain tax refunds, welfare benefits and credit cards.
Anton Nguyen, 54, of Fountain Valley, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge James V. Selna, who also ordered him to pay $3.77 million in restitution, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Nguyen pleaded guilty in April in Santa Ana federal court to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States.
Nguyen conspired with John Tran, of Fountain Valley, an Orange County Social Services Agency case worker. Tran stole the Social Security numbers and other personal identifying information from his clients — many of them recent immigrants. From August 2010 to June 2019, Tran and his accomplices used the stolen information to fraudulently obtain money from the federal government, the State of California, Orange County and financial institutions, court papers show.
Around the same time, Nguyen owned and operated Century Travel & Tax, a tax preparation company based in Westminster. Nguyen joined the conspiracy in 2012 and used the Tran-provided stolen identities to create fraudulent tax forms purporting to show payments made to the identity theft victims by companies, including those controlled by Tran and his co-conspirators. He also helped his accomplices set up shell companies to promote the scheme.
Nguyen prepared and filed federal income tax returns using the stolen identities. He also used the purported payments on the fraudulent tax forms as income to the identify theft victims, making them appear to qualify for tax credits, including the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, evidence showed.
In turn, the reported payments to the identity theft victims were used by Nguyen’s clients to offset business revenue and reduce the taxes they owed by making it appear that the identity theft victims worked for them. In exchange for the fabrication of the tax forms, Nguyen’s clients paid him a fee.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Tran and his co-conspirators filed 433 tax returns using personal information belonging to others, generating at least $973,153 in fraudulently obtained tax refund payments from the United States.
In total, Nguyen, aided by accomplices, defrauded the federal government out of the payment of at least $3.77 million in taxes.
“This was an appreciably sophisticated tax evasion scheme, involving the theft and improper use of (personal information) by a civil servant to generate fraudulent deductions for businesses,” prosecutors argued in a sentencing memorandum. “For the scheme to succeed, tax preparers, like (Nguyen), were essential.”
Federal prosecutors said they’ve obtained guilty pleas from eight others involved in the conspiracy.
