Richard Pierce, a Michigan business owner, was sentenced to serve a year and a day in prison for obstructing and impeding the internal revenue laws and committing bank fraud.
According to documents filed with the court, in 2007, Pierce committed bank fraud by submitting a fraudulent loan application to a mortgage lender on which he failed to disclose that the buyer of a residential property was receiving a kickback from the seller.
Pierce also filed fraudulent 2004 through 2013 individual income tax returns. Those returns failed to report more than $9 million in gross business receipts that several of his real estate businesses earned, including Phoenix Real Estate Company, Phoenix Preferred Properties LLC, Detroit Matrix, First Metro Properties LLC, First Metro Real Estate Services LLC, Phoenix Office Plaza-II LLC, Rosedale/Grandmont Properties LLC, and RFP Ventures LLC. As a result of those fraudulent filings, Pierce caused a tax loss of more than $400,000.
In addition to the term of prison imposed, Pierce was ordered to serve two years of supervised release and to pay restitution to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the amount of which will be determined at a later date. Pierce pleaded guilty in February 2015.
Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division commended special agents of IRS Criminal Investigation, who conducted the investigation, and Trial Attorneys Mark McDonald and Christopher O’Donnell of the Tax Division, who prosecuted the case. Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg also thanked the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan for their substantial assistance.
