Jonathan Carrillo, 34, of Saint Cloud, Osceola County, Florida, United States and Franklin Levon Carter Jr., 33, of Sanford, Seminole County, Florida have pleaded guilty before Magistrate Judge David Baker to tax crimes related to a scheme to prepare false tax returns for clients. Carillo and Carter’s trial was supposed to start on June 2, 2025.
In an unrelated case, Carter was detained in Orange County, Florida on March 3, 2019. He was charged with battery (dating violence), battery by strangulation (domestic violence) and aggravated assault with firearm (domestic violence).
From NAT to Taxmates
From 2016 to 2020, Carrillo and Carter owned and operated a return preparation business called Neighborhood Advance Tax (NAT). The business had a dozen offices throughout Florida.
Carrillo, Carter and their co-conspirators held periodic training sessions teaching other NAT employees how to prepare fraudulent tax returns. They fabricated deductions on the returns of their clients, fraudulently inflating the clients’ tax refunds.
Carter failed file personal tax returns for 2019 through 2021. In 2021, he, Carrillo and their co-conspirators started another tax return preparation business called Taxmates, which operated out of the same offices that NAT had previously used.
Using Taxmates, Carillo, Carter and their co-conspirators prepared false tax returns for clients, many of which included false deductions. The fraudsters also taught franchise owners and employees how to prepare false returns for clients.
Among the co-conspirators are Abryle de la Cruz, Adon Hemley, Diandre Mentor and Emmanuel Almonor, who have pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the U.S. as part of the same scheme. Another co-conspirator named Isaiah Hayes has pleaded guilty to helping others file false returns.
Both Carrillo and Carter Jr. pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the U.S. In addition, the former pleaded guilty to assisting in the preparation of false tax returns and the latter pleaded guilty to not filing tax returns.
Collectively, Carrillo and Carter caused a tax loss to the Internal Revenue Service exceeding $12 million. They face a maximum sentence of five years in prison for the conspiracy charge and will be sentenced at a later date.
Moreover, Carillo faces a maximum sentence of three years in prison for each charge of assisting in the preparation of a false tax return and Carter faces a maximum sentence of one year in prison for each failure to file a tax return charge. They both face a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.
CONAN Daily 