April 19, 2016-Atlanta 

On Monday April 18, 2016 Georgia Department of Revenue Agents executed 4 search
warrants throughout the metro Atlanta area related to fraudulent tax preparers. The
locations included businesses in Fulton, Gwinnett, Cobb and DeKalb Counties. In
addition to the search warrants, arrest warrants were issued for Chanel Uboh, Jahaya
Whitmore, Michael Williams, and Phyllis Spears. Williams, Uboh, and Whitmore were
arrested. Ms. Spears currently has active warrants out for her arrest.

The Georgia Department of Revenue opened criminal fraud cases into Marmos
Financial (Uboh), Whitlan Tax Services (Whitmore), Professional Accounting Realty
Tax Service (Williams), and Epiphany Financial Services (Spears). The Office of
Special Investigations found these businesses were filing fraudulent returns that
included:

  • Filing schedule A forms containing inflated deductions for unreimbursed employee expenses, medical and dental expenses, and gifts to charity;
  • Filing Schedule C forms containing false businesses with inflated losses to offset taxable income that the taxpayer had no knowledge of;
  • Utilizing counterfeit W-2 documents to support filed state tax returns;
  • False education credits;
  • Questionable dependents.

Criminal charges include computer forgery and false statements, both felonies.


Taxpayers who had fraudulent returns prepared on their behalf by these businesses
must repay all of the refund dollars that were fraudulently obtained.


Josh Waites, Director of the Office of Special Investigations said “These individuals do
a disservice to legitimate tax preparers who comply with Georgia Tax Law. We will
continue to find and track others who are cheating the state.”

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