Results tagged “taxevasion”

Rep. Charles Rangel is the Teflon Rep! Even though he apparently knows nothing about paying his own taxes, he's keeping the chairmanship of the House Ways and Means Committee—which is involved with the country's tax code!

Method Man, a member of Staten Island's hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan, was arrested yesterday for tax evasion. He turned himself to the 120th Precinct and when he was taken to his arraignment, he used a copy of "Ultimate X-Men" to cover his face. Really—video below.

Back in 2005, it was the biggest residential land deal in the history of the city—Hudson Waterfront Associates, the Hong Kong-based consortium that worked with Donald Trump to develop and market the massive Trump Place development on the West Side, sold a 77 acre parcel of land to Extell for $1.76 billion. Now the Manhattan DA's office revealed it just arrested the project director for tax evasion and are looking into whether Hudson Waterfront evaded taxes on a $17 million portion of deal.

The owner of a popular bar and restaurant near Yankee Stadium was charged with allegedly evading over $1 million in state and city taxes. Joe Bastone, who is also president of the Yankee Tavern on 161st Street in the Bronx, was being investigated by the Department of Finance for two years; the DOF looked at five years worth of business records, customer receipts and more. The NY Times notes, "Because of its proximity to Yankee Stadium, and its history as a haunt for New York Yankee legends past and present, including Babe Ruth, the tavern has long been a popular watering hole for the team’s fans." Bastone pleaded not guilty to the charges, which include grand larceny and false returns, but sources tell NY1 that his lawyers are looking to make a deal with prosecutors.

Former police commissioner Bernard Kerik pleaded not guilty to additional charges at his arraignment in federal court yesterday. The Daily News reports the new charges accuse him of "falsifying income tax records and not declaring a BMW luxury car he got as payment for consulting services." Kerik was previously indicted on 16 other charges, including conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud, tax fraud and making false statements (to the Department of Homeland Security), last year. Kerik had requested his DHS-related trial be moved from Washington D.C. to White Plains, but White Plains Federal Court Judge Stephen Robinson shot that down for now. Kerik is due back in court in February.

After a week of defending his years of missed tax payments as the amount he owed only grew from what originally revealed, Governor Paterson's top adviser Charles O'Byrne resigned yesterday. The governor accepted the letter of resignation from his closest aide "with regret" after publicly defending O'Byrne who had been lambasted by the NY Post and others in the press for claiming his depression and "non-filer syndrome" had led to years of tax delinquency that totaled over $300,000.

Newsday is reporting that beloved coal-oven pizza institution Grimaldi’s was shut down today by the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance. The paper's website has it that the Brooklyn restaurant was seized because of over $150,000 in tax warrants. Agency spokesman Tom Bergin told Newsday that Grimaldi's has been in a dispute with tax officials over allegedly unpaid state sales and withholding taxes for two years.

Illegally renting subleased apartments as hotel rooms is nothing new, but Raziel Ofer, who "controlled hundreds of units at swanky uptown addresses" (at Woogo.com), was caught by Manhattan prosecutors because he never paid over $1 million in sales tax to the city and state. D'oh! He also apparently "evaded up to $2 million in other fees"; Ofer pleaded guilty and now faces between 8 1/3 to 25 years in prison. Manhattan DA Robert Morgenthau groused, "Illegal hotels are getting to be a major problem."

A grand jury voted to indict former police commissioner Bernard Kerik on federal corruption charges yesterday and, this morning, he surrender to the FBI in White Plains. The indictment was sealed, but the 16 counts include charges of "conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud, tax fraud and making false statements." The U.S. Attorney's office, which sought the indictment, and the FBI are giving a press conference now; U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York...