Flushing Karaoke Bar Owner Gets 1 Year In Prison For Tax Evasion

FLUSHING, QUEENS — A Queens man will spend just over a year in prison for failing to pay employment taxes for his karaoke bar in Flushing, the Justice Department announced Thursday.

From 2011 to 2013, Kae Wook Lee diverted receipts from his karaoke bar to bank accounts in the name of shell companies he'd created, according to court documents. He then withdrew money from those accounts to pay his workers in cash and didn't pay employment taxes to the I.R.S., according to the Justice Department's tax division.

Lee also signed false tax returns that underreported his employees' wages and the taxes owed, the Justice Department said. He ran the karaoke bar through a corporation called Mona Lisa 7 Corporation, but investigators did not release the name of the bar.

Lee was sentenced Thursday to a year and one day in prison, plus two years of supervised release. He also has to pay $612,500 in restitution to the I.R.S. He pleaded guilty in 2018.