A 49-year-old man will be sentenced today after admitting to swindling almost $600,000 in Value Added Tax (VAT) returns from the Board of Inland Revenue (BIR). Richard MacArthur, a messenger employed with the Ministry of Legal Affairs, pleaded guilty to 71 criminal charges under the VAT Act when he appeared yesterday before Magistrate Melvin Daniel in the Port-of-Spain Magistrates' Court.
He was granted $600,000 bail before being ordered to return to the court later today for sentencing. Nine of the charges stemmed from nine companies which failed to submit their accounting records and other financial documents to the BIR within the period requested by the board. The documents were not submitted from 2009 to 2010.
MacArthur is listed as a director of the companies, which have registered offices in San Fernando, Tunapuna and Diego Martin. According to the 52 other charges, between 2009 and 2010, MacArthur claimed almost $600,000 in VAT returns from the board, knowing the returns were fraudulent and misleading. The returns of all nine companies were filed at the BIR's St Vincent Street, Port-of-Spain, offices.
MacArthur was charged with the offences, via summons, after an investigation into his taxes by criminal tax investigator Adesh Ramdeo. After the charges were read to him, attorney Evans Welch, who prosecuted the matter for the BIR, said the facts in the evidence and the facts in the case were simple and could be explained in five minutes.
When asked, Welch did not oppose bail for the messenger, noting he had admitted to the offences on his first court appearance. After taking almost two hours to read the charges to MacArthur, Daniel declined to sentence MacArthur, saying tax law was not his specialty and it should be handled by a different magistrate. MacArthur was represented by Richard Clarke-Wills. Daniel transferred the matter to Magistrate Marcia Murray.
