From staff reports
L’Observateur

BATON ROUGE — A Destrehan tax preparer and her husband face felony counts of fraud and tax evasion, the Louisiana Department of Revenue announced Wednesday.

 The charges against Ihsia Eugene and Tedrick Eugene, of Destrehan, are the result of a joint anti-fraud investigation by the Department of Revenue and the state Attorney General’s office.

Investigators say as a partner in Secure Tax Service, Ihsia Eugene filed tax returns, claiming fabricated business loss deductions on behalf of clients who did not own businesses, or who had not sustained any business losses. The phony deductions resulted in $62,660 in fraudulent refunds.

Eugene is accused also of under reporting the income she earned from Secure Tax Service. She reported earnings of $22,000 in 2012, when bank records demonstrate she earned $84,704.38.

In 2013, she failed to file a tax return at all on earnings of $88,296. In all, she is suspected of evading state taxes on income of $151,000.

She was booked Tuesday into the East Baton Rouge Parish Prison on 11 counts of filing or maintaining false public records, 11 counts of computer fraud, two counts of criminal penalty for evasion of tax and one count of failure to file.

In a related case, authorities said, Tedrick Eugene is charged with evading state taxes on income of $28,386 he earned from Secure Tax Service by failing to file a tax return in 2013.

He was arrested Tuesday and booked into the East Baton Rouge Parish Prison on one count of criminal penalty for evasion of tax and one count of failure to file.