Man gets 41 months for fraud
A plea deal gets most charges against Paul Campos dismissed
Paul Lanakila Campos got at least $10,750 in federal tax refunds while sitting behind the bars of a state prison.
The U.S. Attorney's Office alleged that Campos got more than $100,000 in refunds, but dropped most of the charges in exchange for Campos' guilty plea to filing a false claim.
Chief U.S. District Court Judge Helen Gillmor sentenced Campos, 52, to 41 months in prison yesterday for filing a false claim against the United States. Gillmor also ordered Campos to pay restitution, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Les Osborne. According to his plea agreement with federal prosecutors, Campos could have been sentenced to up to five years in prison.
Campos pleaded guilty in February to a single count of filing a false Employer's Quarterly Federal Tax Return, Internal Revenue Service Form 941, claiming a refund of $10,750. In April 2005 a federal grand jury returned an indictment charging him with filing 12 fraudulent IRS Form 941s between April 2000 and July 2002 and collecting $99,167 in returns.
Osborne said Campos did not own or operate any businesses during the period he filed the Form 941s. He was in state prisons on Maui and Oahu from August 2000 to September 2004, according to state Department of Public Safety records.
The indictment also charged Campos with filing false individual federal income tax returns for calendar years 1999, 2000 and 2001 and collecting $18,713 in refunds.
Officials discovered Campos' scheme when a clerk in the business office of Waiawa Correctional Facility noticed he was receiving tax refund checks for periods he was incarcerated.
He is awaiting trial in state court for fraudulently receiving state tax refunds. In April 2003 an Oahu grand jury charged Campos with filing false state tax forms in 2000, 2001 and 2002 and collecting refunds totaling $7,472.
State prisons have had a long-standing procedure in place to catch inmates filing false tax returns, said Louise Kim McCoy, state Department of Public Safety spokeswoman.
Campos is also awaiting trial on Maui on charges of assault and assaulting a law enforcement officer in a May 2005 confrontation with a Maui police officer. The officer fired two shots from his weapon, hitting Campos in the jaw. Police and a witness said Campos struck the officer with a sport utility vehicle.