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QUEENS--A Floral Park man has been charged with a $1.2 million state sales tax theft in connection with his operation of a Jamaica, Queens, used car dealership. The dealership allegedly annually sold between 169 and 337 used motor vehicles that ranged in prices from $500 to $30,000 per vehicle.
"When consumers pay sales taxes they expect those funds to go into the public treasury - not into the business owner's pockets" Queens district attorney Richard Brown said. "In this case, for every $9 in sales tax the defendant was collecting on behalf of the State he was allegedly pocketing $8. By purposefully defrauding New York government of such a significant sum of revenue, money that could have been used for any number of valuable public purposes, the defendant is alleged to have made every New Yorker a victim. Such criminal activity that cheats the government and public will not be tolerated and will be vigorously prosecuted."
Mohammad Ishaque (also known as Muhammad Ishaque Dawood and Jeffrey Dawood), 47, of 79-06 257th Street in Floral Park, is the former president of Junction Autoland Corporation and the owner of New York Autoland Corporation, located, respectively, at 181-28 and 181-30 Hillside Avenue in Queens. He has been charged with grand larceny in the first degree, offering a false instrument for filing in the first degree, scheme to defraud in the first degree and violation of New York Tax Law 1817 (B) Sales and Compensating Use Taxes/Fraud Returns, Statements or Other Documents. If convicted, he faces up to 25 years in prison.
According to the Criminal Court complaint filed in the case, between Sept. 1, 1999 and Feb. 28, 2005, Ishaque, as a high managerial agent of both Junction and New York Autoland, allegedly stole more than $1.2 million in sales tax that he collected from buyers but did not forward to the State Department of Taxation and Finance.
In conducting an audit of Junction Autoland in 2001, the State Tax Department concluded that the defendant had collected $783,197 in sales tax but only reported $24,473 of it to the State. Aware that investigators were reviewing his business dealings, Ishaque is alleged to have shut down his business and reopened a new business at the same location under the name New York Autoland and to have continued to underreport sales tax to the state. It is estimated that between December 2001 and February 2005, Ishaque collected $649,188 in sales tax but only paid $155,072 to the state.
10-28-05
© 2005 North
Country Gazette
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