Boca Raton Hospital Employee Among Those Charged for Identify Theft
By: South Florida Business Journal
Federal authorities this week charged eight people with identity theft for filing fraudulent federal tax refunds in five separate cases, including that of a former Boca Raton Regional Hospital scheduler.
Shalamar Major had access to the personal information of the hospital’s patients and gave it to Tanisha Wright in exchange for the promise of future payments, according to a federal indictment against both of them. Wright allegedly used that information to file 57 fraudulent tax returns seeking $306,720 in refunds. She received the money on debit cards and split the proceeds with Major, according to the charges.
The other people charged were:
- Nael Dawud Sammour, accused of filing 75 fraudulent returns seeking $750,369 in refunds.
- Christopher Rosier and Jeffrey Rosier, accused of seeking $53,976 in fraudulent tax refunds.
- Fednol Pierre and Jeanson Pata, accused of stealing six tax refund payments totaling $52,536.
- Jahed Movlayazdanpahi, charged with three counts of participation in an identity theft tax refund scheme.
The arrests were announced by the United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, the IRS, the Secret Service, the FBI, and other law enforcement agencies.
Florida had the highest rate of identity theft in the U.S. in 2011 at 178 complaints per 100,000 residents, but it was even worse in Miami at 324 complaints, according to the Federal Trade Commission. The per capita number of false tax returns in the City of Miami was 46 times the national average, according to the U.S. Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.
“Identity theft tax refund fraud has spread through South Florida like a virus,” U.S. Attorney Wifredo A. Ferrer said in a news release. “Since the creation of the Strike Force, the U.S. Attorney’s Office has charged 113 defendants responsible for approximately $92 million in stolen identity refund fraud. We will continue to crack down on identity thieves who are lining their pockets with our tax dollars by stealing the personal identification information of others.”
