Former Head of Operations at New York Brokerage Firm Pleads Guilty to Tax Evasion and Filing False Tax Return

A former resident of North Bellmore, New York, pleaded guilty today in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York in Long Island to one count of tax evasion and one count of filing a false federal income tax return, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Caroline D. Ciraolo of the Justice Department’s Tax Division.

According to the indictment, Dominick Pannitti, 38, was head of operations at a securities brokerage firm located in Syosset, New York.  The brokerage firm used an automated system designed to adjust customers’ trading accounts for amounts less than $1,000.  During 2005 and 2006, Pannitti used the automated system to credit his own trading accounts–set up in the name of a corporation that he owned–more than 850 times in increments of less than $1,000.  Pannitti was not entitled to most of these credits, which totaled more than $570,000.  Pannitti failed to report the income on his 2005 and 2006 federal income tax returns.

Pannitti faces a statutory maximum sentence of five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine for the tax evasion count and a statutory maximum sentence of three years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine for the false return count at his sentencing before U.S. District Judge Arthur D. Spatt.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Ciraolo commended the special agents of IRS-Criminal Investigation and the FBI, who investigated the case, and Trial Attorneys Mark Kotila and Jeffrey Bender of the Tax Division, who are prosecuting the case.  Ciraolo also thanked the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York for their substantial assistance.