Isle fraud convict A Hawaii businesswoman convicted of income tax evasion said the U.S. government tried to pressure her to make statements about Unity House President Anthony "Tony" Rutledge.
has parting shot
She says that she was asked to incriminate
Unity House President Anthony RutledgeBy Rosemarie Bernardo
rbernardo@starbulletin.com"I had nine years of harassment. The government could not get me to admit or endorse theories that they have that weren't even true," said Roberta Cabral, a former Unity House consultant, after Senior District Judge Manuel Real sentenced her yesterday to 10 months in prison for failing to pay taxes and using offshore accounts to hide her income from the state and federal governments.
In June 2002, Cabral pleaded guilty to two counts of federal income tax evasion, one count of willful failure to file an income tax return and one count of participating in a wire fraud scheme to defraud Unity House Inc.
In response to Cabral's statements, Special Attorney Edward Groves, of the U.S. Department of Justice Tax Division, said, "I'm stunned (that) after now that she pled guilty and begged for mercy will now accuse the government of being anything less than fair for the multiple crimes she clearly committed.
"If she felt that she was not guilty or was forced by the government, then she should not have pled guilty for the crimes charged, and she is now paying a price for that."
Real also sentenced Cabral to three years of supervised release, payment of $25,000 in restitution to Unity House and 2,500 hours in community service.
According to the plea agreement, Cabral willfully failed to file a federal or state income tax return for tax year 1994 when she received a gross income of more than $50,000 in commissions from North Pacific Investments Inc. for her role in a $10 million offshore investment by Unity House.
She also admitted the money she got for her participation in that scheme was wire-transferred to her through a British Virgin Islands corporation controlled by Cabral and used by her to hide her income.
In August 2000, Cabral and former Unity House Executive Director Roderick "Roddy" Rodriguez were indicted for schemes to defraud the labor union organization. On Aug. 8, Rodriguez was found dead at home after he failed to appear for a federal court arraignment. Police classified it as an apparent suicide.
Two days ago, Rutledge's son, Aaron, was indicted by a federal grand jury with one count of witness tampering charging that he persuaded another person to withhold, conceal or destroy evidence from a federal grand jury proceeding and a related criminal investigation.
Cabral is expected to turn herself in to federal marshals on Jan. 13.