{"id":1482020,"date":"2026-02-19T18:40:58","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T00:40:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1482020"},"modified":"2026-02-19T18:40:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T00:40:58","slug":"business-owner-guilty-in-tax-fraud-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1482020","title":{"rendered":"Business owner guilty in tax fraud case"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-thumbnail wp-image-1482021\" src=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2026\/02\/EASTERNDISTRICTOFTEXAS-196x200.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"196\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2026\/02\/EASTERNDISTRICTOFTEXAS-196x200.png 196w, https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2026\/02\/EASTERNDISTRICTOFTEXAS.png 329w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 196px) 100vw, 196px\" \/>UPSHUR COUNTY &#8212; A woman pleaded guilty on Wednesday in a tax fraud scheme tied to her two Longview businesses, resulting in a tax loss of nearly $250,000. According to the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office of the Eastern District of Texas and our news partner KETK, Marneitha Reese Scott, 57, of Gilmer, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to aid, assist, counsel or advise in tax fraud. Evidence showed that Scott operated two tax return preparer businesses in Longview under the name F.A.S.T. Financial Firm.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cScott and others recruited tax preparers to work at the businesses to prepare and file income tax returns for clients,\u201d the U.S. attorney\u2019s office said. \u201cWith others, Scott created a scheme to defraud the United States by instructing the tax preparers to create fraudulent entries on client tax returns, including, for example, claims for business losses when the client had no business.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The tax returns were reportedly filed by Scott or her employees working at her direction, resulting in a tax loss for tax years 2019-2022 of $243,899.<\/p>\n<p>Scott could face up to five years in federal prison, a potential fine and restitution at sentencing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UPSHUR COUNTY &#8212; A woman pleaded guilty on Wednesday in a tax fraud scheme tied to her two Longview businesses, resulting in a tax loss of nearly $250,000. According to the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office of the Eastern District of Texas and our news partner KETK, Marneitha Reese Scott, 57, of Gilmer, pleaded guilty to conspiracy &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1482020\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Business owner guilty in tax fraud case<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":1482021,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1482020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news-archive-archives"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-06 11:23:13","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1482020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1482020"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1482020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1482022,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1482020\/revisions\/1482022"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1482021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1482020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1482020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1482020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}