A Bronx tax preparer was sentenced Monday to nearly five years in prison for scamming the government and his clients out of nearly $2.6 million by filing false returns.
Mark Goldberg, 40, broke down in tears as he begged for mercy before Manhattan federal Chief Judge Loretta Preska handed out what she called a needed “serious” punishment. It also includes Goldberg forfeiting to the government $500,000 in fees generated through the scheme, paying $2,597,419 in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service and the state, and being subjected to three years of supervised release after serving his prison sentence.
“I would like to apologize for all my bad decisions that I made,” said the weeping Goldberg.
“My family means a lot to me — my children especially. I’m sorry.”
Prosecutors say Goldberg filed more than $7 million in bogus, inflated deductions between 2005 and 2012 for thousands of clients of his storefront tax business, E&M Multi-Services. The false deductions included fraudulent tuition credits of $4,000 on each bogus tax return.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara announced the sentence on Monday.
“Mark Goldberg prepared thousands of fraudulent tax returns that resulted in over $2.5 million in fraudulent refunds for his clients,” Bharara said.
“Now he has to surrender the ill-gotten gains and his liberty.”
Goldberg copped a plea last August to false tax-returns and wire-fraud charges. He had faced up to 26 years in prison before pleading guilty.
His lawyer, Glenn Ripa, had argued for leniency, saying Goldberg has two children and a stepchild who depend on him, and is legally blind.
But Preska said Goldberg has “a long history of fraud” and that this is “a serious offense in need of a serious punishment.”