Tax Evasion Defense: Resident of Heaven

A Twin Cities woman has pleaded guilty to dodging income taxes for many years in connection with her family excavation and sewage treatment business, when she claimed she and her husband were not U.S. citizens but permanent residents of the “Kingdom of Heaven.”

Tami M. May, of Anoka, entered her plea this week in federal court in Minneapolis to obstruction of due administration of IRS laws. She also had been charged with 15 counts of filing false tax returns.

The plea agreement noted that the tax revenue lost for years 2003 through 2007 topped $530,000.

The Mays operate D & T & Son Excavating in Coon Rapids. According to the indictment and prosecutors, they did not file income tax returns or pay income tax from 1998 until 2005, despite receiving payments from customers totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars.

In April 2005, the IRS notified husband Dennis May that he owed taxes for 2003, plus penalties and interest. After that, Tami May made numerous “obstructive and fraudulent filings with the IRS including filing frivolous 'zero income tax returns.' “

She also claimed that she and her husband were not U.S. citizens but permanent residents of the “Kingdom of Heaven” in an attempt to claim hundreds of thousands of dollars in fraudulent income tax refunds, authorities said.

Dennis May has not been charged; the U.S. attorney's office has declined to say whether he would be.

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