Monir Miah of Stove, Staffordshire and owner of The Crown of India has been jailed for 2 years over a ??90,000 tax fraud. HMRC started a routine compliance check after some test purchases by undercover HMRC officers revealed that Mr Miah might have undeclared income. Mr Miah was offered a chance to make a full disclosure through Contractual Disclosure Facility also known as Code of Practice 9 or COP 9. Unfortunately, Mr. Miah did not take this opportunity seriously enough and only declared half of his income. He stated that his restaurant was doing so badly and had to deregister for VAT. These statements were proven wrong by undercover HMRC officers. This effectively meant that the Contractual Disclosure Facility was rejected and he lost his immunity from prosecution. HMRC then started criminal tax investigation and prosecution against Mr. Miah. Eventually Mr. Miah admitted to tax fraud in court where he was sentenced for two years. Mr. Miah is the sixth person to be convicted and jailed for failure to comply with the Contractual Disclosure Facility under Code of Practice 9 over the last 18 months.?? Read more…
We wrote in detail about Contractual Disclosure Facility and Code of Practice 9 (COP 9) in our November newsletter. This type of tax investigation is started when HMRC have reasons to suspect serious tax fraud. The tax fraudsters are given an opportunity under Contractual Disclosure Facility through Code of Practice 9 to make a full disclosure of any underpaid tax. If a full disclosure is made, the Contractual Disclosure Facility offers immunity from criminal prosecution. Our firm has successfully handled and closed a number of Code of Practice 9 tax investigations and managed to agree the lowest possible tax and penalties with HMRC.
If you are going through a Code of Practice 9 or COP 9 investigation, you can call our team of tax investigation specialists for a free and confidential consultation on 0207 998 1834.
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