The Roofer brothers of Jacksonville have been charged with $2.8M in payroll tax fraud using illegal workers

Travis Slaughter had been hanging in jail for over a year when he didn’t pay $2.2 million in fines to the federal government. Then his luck came down.

A federal judge, a grand jury, days before a Jacksonville building contractor’s scheduled hearing last week accused Whether the fine is paid or not, Slaughter and his brother, Tripp, could face new fraud and tax charges in jail and another $3 million in debt.

Brothers who were before business together As a roofing contractor, he was recently accused of evading nearly $2.8 million in payroll taxes while hiring undocumented immigrants in a scam that forged prison time for a father-son duo builder. In January.

“[T]He defendants avoided paying millions of dollars in excess payroll taxes to the IRS… [and] Millions of dollars in premiums to workers’ compensation insurers,” prosecutors argued.

On the flipside of savings, the Feb. 22 complaint alleges that the brothers “failed to provide adequate workers’ compensation insurance coverage … and facilitated the employment of workers who were not legally authorized to work in the United States.”

Travis Slaughter, 51, faces an even longer list of charges — 18 counts, compared to six for Tripp Slaughter, 48, whose charges include four counts of filing false tax returns.

But the claims of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, conspiracy to defraud the government and tax crimes carry the possibility of maximum sentences of dozens of years for both men.

The charges come at the top of Travis Slaughter’s year-long court battle with the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which convinced an appeals court in 2020. Hold him in contempt A series of inspections resulted in $2.2 million in fines not being paid.

A Jacksonville judge appointed by the appeals court to hear the case Reported in 2021 Slaughter, who “knowingly and willfully avoided complying” with the court order to pay, and the appellate judges recommended that he be jailed to face the civil case.

The story continues

Slaughter was already scheduled for one Hear about fines Wednesday with U.S. District Senior Judge Harvey Schlesinger when the indictment was unsealed and the criminal case was also assigned to Schlesinger.

The brothers turned themselves in to the charges on Feb. 24, pleaded not guilty and were released without posting bond. Messages to the men’s attorneys were not returned.

The indictment alleges that the brothers controlled three companies — Great White Construction, Florida Roofing Experts and 5 Star Roofing Services — and provided false information to businesses contracted as “professional employer organizations,” or PEOs, that handle government withholding tax payments. And some premiums for workers comp insurance.

The complaint alleges that roofers only handle part of their payroll through the PEO, causing payrolls to show up, while crew leaders pay the rest of the workers in cash to save on taxes.

“Many of these workers were citizens of other countries who were living and working in the United States illegally,” the complaint said.

Between 2017 and mid-2020, company employees were paid $4.9 million through the PEO and $18.5 million in cash, the complaint said.

In addition to seeking time behind bars for the brothers, prosecutors want them to forfeit $3 million, which is alleged to be the proceeds of the fraud scheme.

The indictment, described as “split payments” between PEOs and crew leaders, generally mirrors a system that two other local contractors, Raul Solis and Raul Solis-Martinez, admitted to when they pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the Internal Revenue Service and were sentenced in January. . 33 months and 21 months behind bars respectively.

Although the criminal case for slaughter has been settled, pressure for OSHA’s fines has also stalled. On Wednesday, Schlesinger rescheduled a hearing on Slaughter’s OSHA debt until May 3 after a U.S. Department of Labor attorney reported that lawyers needed time to sort out the implications of the complaint on collection efforts.

This article originally appeared in the Florida Times-Union: Feds charge Jacksonville brothers, $2.8M in payroll tax scam for Roofing