Westmoreland County Man Sentenced To Prison For Preparing Tax Returns In Violation Of Court's Order

PITTSBURGH - A Westmoreland County resident has been sentenced in federal court to nine months imprisonment, to be followed by 12 months supervised release for violating his term of three years probation, on his conviction of aiding and assisting in the preparation and presentation of false and fraudulent individual income tax returns, United States Attorney David J. Hickton announced today. As a condition of probation imposed on July 26, 2012, Snow was prohibited from preparing tax returns for anyone but himself and his wife.

Senior United States District Judge Maurice B. Cohill, Jr. imposed the sentence on Larry E. Snow, 65.

According to information presented to the court at the original plea and sentence, an IRS examination of a sample of returns defendant prepared for 17 taxpayers during the period from April 15, 2005 to April 15, 2009, showed that Snow prepared 63 false and fraudulent income tax returns, resulting in a tax loss of $98,414. At the revocation hearing on April 21, 2015, Judge Cohill determined that Snow had continued to prepare returns in violation of his probation.

In imposing sentence, at the top of the three-month to nine-month Sentencing Guidelines range, the Court stated Snow’s actions were a “blatant disregard” of the Court’s order.

Assistant United States Attorney Leo M. Dillon prosecuted this case on behalf of the government.

U.S. Attorney Hickton commended the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation for the investigation leading to the successful prosecution of Snow.