Man gets 6-month sentence in tax refund fraud scheme

A citizen of Ecuador who has been living in East Haven was sentenced this week to six months in prison for participating in a tax refund fraud scheme, according to federal authorities.

Edwin F. Gutierrez, 45, also was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton in New Haven to two years of supervised release, according to federal authorities.

Authorities, citing court documents and statements made in court, said that from about May 2013 to April 2017, Gutierrez and several other Ecuadoran nationals participated in a scheme to illegally obtain tax refunds from the IRS.

This was done when “some of Gutierrez’s co-defendants” filed fraudulent federal tax returns in other people’s names and documents that said the claimants lived in the U.S., earned wages here and had federal income tax withheld, authorities said.

“In truth, the claimants never worked for or earned income from those companies. In addition, U.S. Customs and Border Protection have no records of the claimants even being present in the U.S. during the tax years for which the returns were filed,” authorities said in a statement. “Based on these false tax returns, the IRS issued tax refunds, which were then deposited into bank accounts that were controlled by Gutierrez and some of his co-defendants.”

Authorities said Gutierrez and his associates obtained 142 tax refunds, totaling about $435,500 and Gutierrez deposited 69 of those refunds, totaling about $215,460, into his bank accounts.

Gutierrez and three others with were arrested in July 2021 on an indictment charging them with various offenses stemming from the scheme, authorities said. Gutierrez pleaded guilty in Oct. 2022 to theft of public money. Gutierrez’s co-defendants pleaded guilty to related charges, authorities said.