FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE	CONTACT: Lauren Horwood
May 6, 2011	PHONE: (916) 554-2706
www.usdoj.gov/usao/cae	usacae.edcapress@usdoj.gov
Docket #: 1:10-cr-00467 LJO

FRESNO, Calif. — United States Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner announced that today United States District Judge Lawrence J. O'Neill sentenced Abel Robledo, 43, of Fresno, to two years in federal prison and ordered him to pay $13,167 in restitution to the IRS for conspiring to submit false income tax returns to the IRS. Robledo pleaded guilty on March 4, 2011. His co-defendant Patricia Serbera-Robledo, 51, also of Fresno, pleaded guilty on April 29, 2011 to the conspiracy and is scheduled to be sentenced on July 22, 2011, at 9:00 a.m.

Abel Robledo admitted in his guilty plea that from March 2005 to June 2007 he conspired with Serbera-Robledo to submit false individual federal income tax returns to the IRS, in his name and in the names of other state prisoners, while he was incarcerated at Corcoran State Prison and elsewhere. The income tax returns claimed false wage earnings by the prisoners, and claimed false federal income tax withholdings that did not exist, thereby causing the prisoners' income tax returns to fraudulently claim tax refunds. The prisoners actually either had no earnings or earned only a minimal amount, had no withholdings, and were not entitled to any tax refunds. The IRS issued tax refunds totaling more than $13,000 based on the false returns.

This case was the product of a joint investigation by the IRS-Criminal Investigation and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kirk Sherriff.

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