Avon man charged in tax scam conspiracy case

An Avon man is facing conspiracy charges after authorities allege he and others filed hundreds of fraudulent tax returns using information from low-income and homeless people.

Muhammad Hague, 40, was indicted Feb. 14 in the eastern division of U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio along with Richard A. Warren, 37, of Philadelphia, on a single charge of conspiracy to make false claims.

Hague’s sister, Maryam Hague, 38, of Shaker Heights, also was charged with single counts of conspiracy to make false claims and theft of public money.

Warren’s wife, Sabrina Sorrell, and a co-worker of Muhammad Hague’s, Natasha Johnson, were charged with conspiracy to make false claims in July 2017 and August 2017.

The scheme saw 786 false tax returns filed seeking $3,555,095 between 2009 and 2012, according to court documents.

The conspiracy centered around two tax preparation businesses run by the Hague siblings.

Maryam Hague formed Hague United Services in February 2009 and operated it out of her residences in Cleveland and Shaker Heights.

In 2011, Muhammad Hague began operating Hague Financial, according to the indictment.

Between that time and April 2013, Hague and Johnson often conducted business out of the Cleveland Water Department, where Hague works as an assistant water plant manager at the Crown Water Treatment Plant in Westlake, according to court documents.

The Hagues, Warren, Johnson and Sorrell would contact people in low-income areas and homeless residents and gain their personal identification information, the documents say.

Maryam Hague would pay Warren and Sorrell a $1,000 referral fee for each claimant in the Philadelphia area whose information they emailed her, according to multiple court documents.

Sorrell and Warren maintained business bank accounts under the names of shell corporations as a means to receive these funds, the documents say.

The conspirators would file tax returns under these low-income and homeless individuals personal identification information, but the contents were entirely false, the documents allege.

They often claimed dependents the claimants did not know, falsified unverifiable occupations and false educational expenses, the documents say.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office is attempting to seize Maryam Hague’s Lytle Road home in Shaker Heights, as well as any other profits from the alleged conspiracy, according to court documents.

The Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigations division investigated the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Elliot Morrison is prosecuting the case.