Tax Evader Sent To Prison

Item: Don’t mess with the IRS: Idaho businessman sentenced to prison for income tax evasion /Coeur d’Alene Press

More Info: A 51-year-old Hope man on Monday was sentenced to three and a half years in prison and to pay just under $1.4 million in restitution to the IRS for unpaid individual and corporate federal income taxes. Michael George Fitzpatrick, 51, also was given three years of supervised release by U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns. Fitzpatrick was convicted of two counts of income tax evasion in January 2013 by a jury in Coeur d’Alene. A previous jury had convicted him in September 2012 on two counts of failure to file corporate income tax returns but was unable to reach verdicts on the tax evasion counts. He originally was indicted in April 2010. Fitzpatrick was taken into custody immediately after the second trial.’

Question: Is there a lesson to be learned here re: paying your taxes?