Justice Department Seeks to Shut Down Philadelphia Tax Return Preparer

The United States has asked a federal court in Philadelphia to permanently bar Denise Miller Almanza and her business, Denise’s Centro de Servicios, PC, from preparing federal tax returns for others, the Justice Department announced today.  According to the complaint, Almanza inappropriately reduces her customers’ income or wrongly claims tax credits on their returns, causing the customers to receive tax refunds or increased refund amounts to which they are not entitled.  Almanza and her business have prepared more than 14,000 federal tax returns since 2010, according to the complaint.

The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, alleges that Almanza improperly claims the additional child tax credit on customers’ income tax returns, which allow her customers to receive, on average, over $2,900 in improper benefits per tax return.  In total, the complaint alleges that Almanza’s activities over the last four years have potentially cost the U.S. Treasury millions of dollars in lost tax revenue.  

Return preparer fraud is one of the IRS’ Dirty Dozen Tax Scams for 2014.  The IRS has some tips on their website for choosing a tax preparer.  In the past decade, the Justice Department’s Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of unscrupulous tax preparers.  Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department website.

Related Materials:

United States v. Denise Miller Almanza
Complaint