New Jersey Brothers Plead Guilty to Stealing More Than $2.6 Million, Collectively, in Tax Refunds

Two New Jersey brothers pleaded guilty in September to stealing more than $978,126 and $1,643,172, respectively, in tax refunds.

According to court documents and statements made in court, in early 2023, Ronald Chrichlow, of Somerset, and Gordon Chrichlow, formerly of Carteret, each filed a false 2022 Form 1041, U.S. Income Tax Return for Estates and Trusts, on behalf of their trusts. These Forms 1041 falsely reported that the trusts made tax payments to the IRS when they had not and claimed refunds of $978,126 and $1,643,172, respectively. Pursuant to these false filings, in March 2023, the IRS issued Ronald Chrichlow a U.S. Treasury check for $978,126 and Gordon Chrichlow a U.S. Treasury check for $1,643,172. With his proceeds, Gordon Chrichlow purchased a Porsche Taycan for approximately $117,364 and bought a house for approximately $686,258.

In August 2023, the IRS assigned a revenue officer to collect the fraudulently obtained refunds. In response to IRS collection efforts, the Chrichlow brothers mailed to the IRS amended 2022 Forms 1041 for their trusts that removed the originally claimed tax payments. They also mailed 2022 Forms 1040-NR, U.S. Nonresident Alien Income Tax Return, on which they falsely claimed not to be residents of the United States and falsely claimed that their 2022 income was tax exempt pursuant to a tax treaty.

The Chrichlow brothers also willfully failed to file their personal income tax returns in some years, despite earning income. Ronald Chrichlow earned $960,000 in income between 2021 and 2024, but did not file income tax returns between 2022 and 2024. For 2021, he filed a false tax return falsely reporting tax payments he did not make in order to claim a tax refund of $93,228 to which he was not entitled. Gordon Chrichlow willfully failed to file his 2021 through 2024 tax returns, despite earning more than $1.4 million in gross income in those years.

The Chrichlow brothers also filed false COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan applications on behalf of their business entities in 2020 that reported false numbers of employees and false gross receipts, in order to receive loans and grants to which they were not entitled.