Anndrea Jacobs, the office manager and bookkeeper for a medical practice in Portland, Oregon was sentenced to four years in prison for filing false tax returns, falsely impersonating an IRS employee, identity theft, wire fraud and bank fraud.
From 2011 to 2015 Jacobs stole money from the medical practice by writing business checks to herself to pay for personal expenses. In order to cover her tracks she prepared and maintained false financial records, overstating expenses and estimated tax payments. She also opened a business bank account in the owner’s name, without his knowledge, gave the owner false property tax statements with total due balances of zero, and convinced the owner to give her limited power of attorney so she could handle the practice’s IRS tax collection action.
In a bold attempt to conceal her embezzlement activity, Jacobs created a fictitious identity as an IRS Taxpayer Advocate named Linda Gibson, set up a phone number and voicemail for the fictitious identity, and then ‘helped’ the business owner with his IRS issues while pretending to be Linda Gibson.
In addition to the four-year prison sentence, Jacobs has been ordered to pay 1.2 million dollars in restitution.