Snellville Man Charged With Filing False Tax Returns

A Snellville man faces federal charges that, while working as a tax preparer, he filed fraudulent returns, claiming his customers were owed too much money and steering some of that money to his own bank accounts.

Okello Odongo, 36, was indicted Friday in U.S. District Court in New Hampshire on 19 counts of filing false tax returns and fraudulently obtaining tax refunds.

Odongo is a former resident of Manchester, New Hampshire, where he ran a business called Smart Tax Solutions Co.

According to acting U.S. Attorney Donald Feith, Odongo filed false returns for some of his clients in 2011 and 2012. In addition to asking for more money than the customers were owed, the indictments claim, Odongo directed the IRS to deposit the extra money into bank accounts he owned or to which he had access.

None of Odongo’s customers knew he was using their returns to defraud the government, according to the indictments.

At a hearing last week in New Hampshire, Odongo pleaded not guilty to the charges. A trial in the case is set for Jan. 5, 2016.

If convicted, Odongo faces a maximum of five years for each of the 19 counts.