A Miami federal judge sent a Broward woman to prison for nearly six years for a tax-refund scam linked to a U.S. Marine accused of supplying her with the stolen IDs of fellow service members.
A Broward County woman was sentenced Thursday to nearly six years in prison for stealing the identities of U.S. Marines and others in a tax-refund scam designed to trick the Internal Revenue Service into sending her thousands of dollars.
Dorothy Boulin, 29, of Coral Springs, plotted with a Marine from North Miami who allegedly supplied her with the stolen IDs of fellow Marines while he was stationed in Afghanistan, according to charges filed in federal court.
Boulin, sentenced by U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore in Miami, pleaded guilty in April to ID theft and wire fraud. Her case stood out from numerous other South Florida tax-fraud cases prosecuted by the U.S. attorney’s office because of the Marine-Afghanistan connection.
In a letter to the judge, the defendant’s parents, Jean and Marielle Boulin, described their daughter as a “hard-working, independent and caring mother” and asked Moore for “some leniency” to give her a “second chance in making better choices.”
According to the charges, Boulin used an electronic IRS number — typically issued to legitimate tax preparers — on her home computer to file false returns in the names of at least 14 people, including several Marines serving in the U.S. war against the Taliban in Afghanistan. The bogus returns, processed in January with an online tax-filing company called OLT PRO, sought about $54,000 in refunds.
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