A federal grand jury sitting in Miami, Florida, returned an indictment on Tuesday, April 10 charging a Miami, Florida, certified public accountant with tax evasion, failing to file tax returns and failing to pay over payroll taxes to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), announced Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Richard E. Zuckerman of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and U.S. Attorney Benjamin G. Greenberg for the Southern District of Florida.

According to the indictment, Darryl Sharpton owned The Sharpton Group, a Miami-based public accounting firm that specialized in financial and management consulting, audit and attestation, and tax and wealth planning.  Sharpton allegedly filed personal income tax returns for the years 2004 through 2008 and 2010, but failed to pay the reported taxes.  Sharpton is further alleged to have failed to file personal income tax returns for years 2011 through 2016 despite his obligation to do so.

The indictment charges that after Sharpton failed to pay his taxes, the IRS audited and assessed additional taxes against him and issued levies and liens in further effort to collect the unpaid taxes.  Sharpton allegedly responded by removing himself from his company’s payroll, paying his personal expenses through the corporate bank accounts, and lying to an IRS collections official.

In addition, the indictment alleges that Sharpton failed to timely pay over to the IRS payroll taxes that he withheld from the paychecks of The Sharpton Group’s employees.

If convicted, Sharpton faces a statutory maximum sentence of five years in prison for the tax evasion charge, five years in prison for each count of failing to pay over payroll taxes, and one year in prison for each count of failing to file tax returns.  He also faces a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.  An indictment merely alleges that a crime has been committed.  A defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Zuckerman and U.S. Attorney Greenberg commended special agents of IRS Criminal Investigation, who investigated the case, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Clark and Tax Division Trial Attorneys Sean Beaty, Mara Strier, and Charles M. Edgar, Jr., who are prosecuting the case.