- February 5, 2026
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A Lakeland tax preparer will serve nearly five years in federal prison and must pay back $12.9 million after pleading guilty to crimes including filing 458 false tax returns.
Jeffrey Dixon, whose age was not disclosed, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Mary S. Scriven to four years and nine months in prison for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and three years for aiding and assisting in the filing of false and fraudulent tax returns. The sentences will run concurrently, according to court records.
Dixon, who pleaded guilty in August, must also forfeit $1.09 million and pay the Internal Revenue Service $12.96 million in restitution.
According to a copy of the plea agreement and a statement from the U.S. Department of Justice, here is what happened:
Between January 2019 and July 2023, Dixon prepared or helped prepare 458 fraudulent tax returns. Five of those were for himself, and the remaining 453 were for others.
In all, he filed returns for 318 individuals for the tax years 2018 through 2022.
The Justice Department says the returns, Form 1040s filed electronically, included fake wins and losses from gambling and included federal tax withholding amounts based on the falsified winnings.
(Among the forms that were included in the filings were fraudulent Form W-2Gs that are used by gambling institutions to report gambling winnings and any federal income tax withheld on those winnings.)
In one 2022 filing for a person identified in the plea agreement as K.F., the Form 1040 Dixon prepared claimed K.F. had won $774,550 at an unnamed casino, which then withheld $196,637 of that money for federal income tax.
The tax return claimed K.F. was due — and received — a refund of $182,265.
The reality, however, was that K.F. had not won the money and, in fact, the casino reported K.F. had lost $774,550 and that it had never filed a Form W-2G for K.F.
The following year, in January, Dixon admits in the plea agreement, he filed a return in his own name claiming gambling wins and tax payments that earned him a refund. On February 15, 2023, he received a refund check from the IRS for $137,726.60 when “he was not entitled to a refund.”
The plot began to unravel on July 25, 2023, when federal agents served a search warrant on Dixon’s home. During the search, they found hard documents related to the tax returns; fraudulent Form 1040s, schedules and Form W-2Gs on his computer; and text messages with coconspirators on his cell phone.
According to the Justice Department, the total intended loss from the tax returns Dixon prepared was $42.35 million. The actual loss totaled $12.96 million, which was paid out either as refunds or as credit applied to debts.
The agreement says that Dixon personally collected $1.09 million from the scheme — $885,520 in tax preparation fees and $208,032 from fraudulent returns in his own name.
The case was investigated by the IRS’s criminal investigation division. It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Ross Roberts and Jennifer Peresie. The forfeiture is being handled by Assistant United States Attorney Suzanne C. Nebesky.
