Long Island Tax Preparer Bilked IRS Out of $12M in COVID Scheme She Used to Buy Jewelry, a Honda — and Even a House in DR: Prosecutors; Cuomo Continues to Deflect Blame Over Admin’s Disastrous COVID-19 Nursing Home Directive in Half-Baked Apology, and other C-Virus related stories
Long Island tax preparer bilked IRS out of $12M in COVID scheme she used to buy jewelry, a Honda — and even a house in DR: prosecutors:
A Long Island tax preparer allegedly bilked the IRS out of $12 million in a COVID scheme she used to buy jewelry, a Honda — and a house in the Dominican Republic.
Damaris Beltre, 57, filed false tax returns for her clients between 2021 and 2024, and launched a scheme to illegally obtain Payroll Protection Program loans during the pandemic, federal prosecutors said.
“The defendant’s fraudulent work as a tax preparer and in furtherance of a COVID-19 loan scheme, cost the government millions of dollars,” John Durham, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement Wednesday.
“All while she generated a stream of illicit revenue for herself that she used to purchase, among other things, a home in the Dominican Republic, a car and jewelry,” Durham added.
The feds say Beltre stole over $11 million through various tax schemes and another $1 million through PPP scams.
She allegedly got the money to fuel her expensive tastes by charging clients exorbitant prices for her fraudulent services — earning over $1 million in fees for her work including a percentage of any refund she helped get, according to the feds.
In one instance, an undercover investigation led an agent to seek out Beltre to file their tax returns. If done correctly, the agent would have owed around $205 to the IRS.
Instead, Beltre filed a return that saw the agent receive a $14,000 refund, charging the agent $2,200 in fees for getting him the massive payout. —>READ MORE HERE
Cuomo continues to deflect blame over admin’s disastrous COVID-19 nursing home directive in half-baked apology:
Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo continued to deflect blame over his administration’s controversial directive to send infected COVID-19 patients into nursing homes — which resulted in thousands of deaths — during the worst period of the killer pandemic.
During an interview with FOX 5 NY, Cuomo, who recently entered the Big Apple’s mayoral race, offered a half-baked apology to repeated questions about the pandemic and failed to assume responsibility for the disastrous March 2020 decision that shuttled sick patients into senior care facilities statewide.
The disgraced pol, who resigned from the governor’s office in 2021 following a slew of scandals, instead placed fault on health care experts who he said “did not know how many people were going to die.”
“COVID was a horrendous, once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. It focused on nursing homes, as you know, because that’s where COVID preyed the most,” Cuomo, 67, told reporter Rosanna Scotto at the Rain Boston Road Senior Center in the Bronx Friday.
“Two million Americans died during COVID. Every one of them was a tragedy. People died in nursing homes in New York under the worst situations imaginable.”
When asked if he owed New Yorkers whose family members died inside nursing homes an apology, Cuomo responded: “I’m sorry for what they had to go through.”
“It was horrific,” he continued, adding that he followed the regulations advised by health experts.
“I get why the health department wanted these restrictions, but it was a terrible, terrible situation.”
Cuomo then questioned why it took the federal government so long to create proper testing and vaccines to combat the virus, claiming the feds knew about COVID months before it led to a nationwide shutdown. —>READ MORE HERE
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