Yesterday, a federal jury found a man from Maryland guilty of conspiracy to commit insurance fraud, money laundering, filing fraudulent tax returns, and identity theft.
According to court filings and evidence produced at trial, James Wilson, who lives in Owings Mills, is accused of working with others to deceive insurance companies by acquiring more than 30 life insurance policies for applicants by misrepresenting their health, wealth, and current life insurance coverage. The total death benefits paid out by this insurance was more than $20 million.
Wilson also plotted to deceive individual investors to acquire monies that he then used to pay premiums on life insurance policies that he had gotten via illegal means. Wilson moved the fraudulent money through several bank accounts, including accounts in the names of trusts, to hide the wrongdoing. Wilson submitted phony individual income tax forms for 2018 and 2019, which hid roughly $5.7 million and $2 million of the money gained through fraud.
On May 1, Wilson will be sentenced. He could be sentenced to a maximum of 20 years in prison for each count of conspiracy, wire fraud, mail fraud, and money laundering. He could also be sentenced to a maximum of three years in prison for each count of filing a false tax return. Wilson could be sentenced to a maximum of two years for each count of aggravated identity theft. After considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory variables, a judge from a federal district court will decide on any punishment.
The announcement was made by Karen E. Kelly, the Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Tax Division; Erek L. Barron, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland; and Kareem A. Carter, the Special Agent in Charge of the IRS Criminal Investigation’s Washington, D.C. Field Office.
The Maryland Insurance Administration and the Maryland Attorney General assisted the IRS-CI in investigating the case.
Trial attorneys Shawn Noud and Richard Kelley from the Tax Division, as well as Assistant U.S. Attorneys Matthew Phelps and Philip Motsay from the District of Maryland, are prosecuting the case.