One of the promoters of a bogus foreign currency exchange investment fund that effectively operated as a Ponzi scheme has been sentenced to nearly two years in jail on tax charges.
Marlyn D. Hinders, of Colorado, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer in Los Angeles to 21 months in federal prison for obstructing and impeding the due administration of the internal revenue laws. The 72-year-old was also sentenced to one year of supervised release on condition that he cooperate with the IRS and pay all taxes due along with a $25,000 fine.
Hinders, 72, promoted the Genesis Fund along with eight other defendants whom the Justice Department and the IRS have been prosecuting (see
Hinders, one of nine defendants in this investigation, admitted last December that he used nominee entities and bank accounts to conceal income and assets from the IRS. He also failed to declare the existence of a foreign-based financial account in Costa Rica to the IRS.
According to the plea agreement, Hinders admitted that between 1999 through 2002, he received over $925,000 in taxable distributions from the Genesis Fund. Hinders also admitted that he failed to report a portion of these taxable distributions to the IRS.
Hinders was a fugitive until June 2011 when he was deported from Mexico and arrested by the U.S. Marshal’s Service. After a detention hearing in July 2011, Judge Fischer ordered Hinders held without bond.
Of the nine defendants originally charged in this case, all have pleaded guilty to charges including tax fraud, obstruction of justice and securities violations. Judge Fischer sentenced many of the defendants to significant prison terms and ordered restitution payments totaling millions of dollars.
