CONSTRUCTION COMPANY PRESIDENT PLEADS GUILTY TO 69 COUNTS OF TAX CRIMES AND STRUCTURING
PENSACOLA, FLORIDA – United States Attorney Pamela C. Marsh, Northern District of Florida, announced that Mauricio Soto, age 34, of Navarre, Florida, pled guilty to a 69 count superseding indictment before Senior U.S. District Judge Lacey A. Collier on Thursday. The superseding indictment charged Soto with failing to file federal corporate income tax returns, in violation of Title 26, United States Code (U.S.C.), Section 7203, structuring U.S. currency transactions to willfully evade a cash reporting requirement, in violation of Title 31, U.S.C., Section 5324(a)(3), and fraudulent use of a social security number, in violation of Title 42, U.S.C., Section 408.
Soto, the president of Mauricio Soto Concrete Construction, Inc., of Navarre, Florida, admitted to knowingly structuring cash withdrawals in order to avoid federal currency reporting requirements during the period January of 2006, through October of 2007. During this period, 62 checks in the amount of $9,500 each were negotiated for cash, totaling $589,000, in an attempt to evade the requirement that financial institutions make reports of currency transactions greater than $10,000. Soto also admitted to having failed to file the federal corporate income tax returns for his business, Mauricio Soto Concrete Construction, Inc., for the years 2005 through 2009. Soto’s concrete and framing business generated over $9 million in gross receipts during the years 2005 through 2009 from new housing construction.
Soto faces a maximum of 10 years imprisonment and a $500,000 fine for each of the violations of Title 31, U.S.C., Section 5324(a)(3); a maximum of 1 year imprisonment and a $25,000 fine for each of the violations of Title 26, U.S.C., Section 7203; and a maximum of 5 years imprisonment and a fine a $250,000 for each violation of Title 42. Soto can also be required to pay all back taxes.
Additionally, Soto faces deportation from the United States following the service of any prison sentence, as Soto was not a citizen of the United States and was in the United States unlawfully.
Sentencing is scheduled before Judge Collier on April 12, 2011.
This case was investigated by the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation. Assistant United States Attorney Stephen Preisser prosecuted the case.
