Woman Pleads Guilty For Defrauding The Internal Revenue Service

SAN JUAN, P.R. – Today, defendant Mariely Malavet-Rivera pled guilty before United States District Judge Francisco A. Besosa to twenty-four counts of wire fraud, one count of theft of public money, and one count of aggravated identity theft, announced Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico.

These charges stemmed from a scheme utilized by Mariely Malavet-Rivera from 2010-2013 to submit false Federal tax returns seeking the additional child tax credit (ACTC) in order to obtain fraudulent tax refunds from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) via check and direct deposit. Personal identification information including individuals’ names, dates of birth, and social security numbers were utilized without the knowledge or consent of the individual in order to request and obtain the fraudulent tax refunds.

The false Federal tax returns contained defendant’s own postal address and bank account information so that the fraudulent refunds would be deposited via wire transfer to bank accounts Malavet-Rivera controlled and the physical checks would be mailed to her postal address. Defendant then used a fraudulent driver’s license or voter registration identification to cash the fraudulent refund checks through an intermediary company.

The fraudulent tax refund scheme had a total value of approximately $227,653.22.

The case was investigated by the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) and prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Seth A. Erbe. The defendant is scheduled to be sentenced on January 13, 2016.