Agawam Man Sentenced For Embezzlement

BOSTON – An Agawam tax preparer was sentenced yesterday in U.S. District Court in Springfield for embezzling more than $400,000 from a corporate client.

James F. Hansmann, 86, of Agawam, Mass., was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Michael A. Ponsor to three years of probation and ordered to pay $408,035 in restitution to his client and $86,692 to the Internal Revenue Service. Hansmann also is permanently enjoined from preparing tax returns. In July 2013, Hansmann pleaded guilty to mail fraud and tax evasion.

Hansmann prepared corporate tax returns for a West Springfield company. Between 2007 and 2011, he instructed the company president to make out checks for estimated tax payments which he promised he was transmitting to the Internal Revenue Service. Instead, Hansmann deposited the checks into his personal bank accounts and used the money to pay person expenses. The West Springfield company was left with a huge tax bill for the years of unpaid taxes, which its president believed had been fully paid.

United States Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz; William P. Offord, Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigations in Boston; and Shelly Binkowski, Inspector in Charge of the United States Postal Inspection Service, made announcement. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Karen L. Goodwin of Ortiz’s Springfield Branch Office.