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TAMPA — Businessman John D. Stanton III was sentenced to 10 years in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $37.8 million for failing to file personal tax returns, as well as corporate returns for Cast-Crete Inc.
Stanton, 64, was convicted in December but his sentencing was delayed until Thursday at his attorney's request. He has been jailed since September 2012.
Once an Ernst & Young auditor, Stanton joined Ralph Hughes at Florida Engineered Construction Products Corp. in 1981, court records show. Stanton eventually became president and co-owner of the Seffner-based company, better known as Cast-Crete, with Hughes, who died in 2008.
A jury convicted Stanton of failing to file tax returns for the business between 2004 and 2008. He also was convicted of not filing personal returns in 2005 and 2007.
Court records show that between 2001 and 2007, Cast-Crete made $160 million in profit and should have paid the IRS an estimated $55 million.
In addition, Stanton was also convicted of interfering with an Internal Revenue Service audit of the company by creating and backdating two fraudulent demand promissory notes for $500 million to justify millions of dollars transferred to him and Hughes, as well another company that Stanton owned, says a statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office, Middle District of Florida.
An examination of Stanton's computer showed the promissory notes were dated September 2003 but actually created in 2008, court records show.
Stanton also failed to file corporate tax returns on behalf of Denouement Strategies Inc. for 2006 and 2007. Stanton, the sole owner of Denouement, transferred $43 million from Cast-Crete to that company in 2005 and 2006.
Stanton used his education and skills as an M.B.A. and CPA to purposefully impede the IRS, James D. Robnett, an IRS special agent, says in a statement.
Stanton's attorney, meanwhile, says his client helped Hughes transform Cast-Crete into a national leader in precast concrete products, records show.
The attorney says Stanton as a good family man with three young children and three grown children. He was given both the Purple Heart and Bronze Star for his service in the Vietnam War.
“There was no testimony that the success of the Cast-Crete was due to illegal or unethical business practices,” attorney Paul DeCailly says in court documents.
Prosecutors created “the illusion he (Stanton) was an evil man for living well,” DeCailly says in documents, referring to testimony about the Maybach car that Stanton bought for his wife, Susan, and the Hummer for her sister.
Special Agent Robnett says crimes against the IRS aren't victimless.
“This sentence should serve as a reminder to all Americans of the consequences of purposefully flouting their civic responsibilities,” Robnett says in the release.
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