Denver man failed to pay $2.5 million in taxes

With a debt of more than $2.5 million in employment taxes and making numerous false claims, a man from Denver now faces a hefty fine of up to $250,000, not to mention the jail time of up to 5 years per count of charge. The man, identified as Lucilious J. Ward was indicted last October 2 by a federal tax jury.

In a statement released by United States Attorney John Walsh, he says “Business owners who withhold their employees’ money for taxes, but steal those funds for their own use, are victimizing their employees and the United States.”

Ward, owner of the business named Global Access, was found to have willfully and knowingly did not truthfully account for the taxes he withheld from his employees salaries, amounting to $2,556,764.  This was comprised of Social Security taxes, federal income taxes and MediCare taxes as well. He also fraudulently listed two false claims of federal income tax withholdings, one for $34, 168, and another for $76, 479, attempting to cheat the government of over $110,000 in IRS refunds.

Lilia Ruiz, the Acting Special Agent-in-charge for the Criminal Investigation of the IRS Denver field office, said, “Business owners who withhold and fail to remit employment tax withholdings are merely stealing from their employees and other Americans”.

Although innocent until proven guilty, Ward is still being charged with a total of 19 counts of failure to pay over tax, and another 2 counts of making false claims against the IRS.