Date: October 28, 2022 Contact: newsroom@ci.irs.gov Texarkana, AR — An Arkansas man pleaded guilty on October 25, 2022, to filing a false tax return with the IRS on which he did not report all of the income he earned from his business. According to court documents and statements made in court, Clarence A. Joles, Sr., of Texarkana, owned Rock Hard Paving, an asphalt paving business, which he operated as a sole proprietorship. Joles admitted that he deposited Rock Hard Paving's gross receipts into approximately nine different bank accounts, then intentionally withheld from his tax preparer records from some of those accounts. As a result, the tax preparer did not have access to Rock Hard Paving's true income, and Joles caused a false 2015 personal tax return to be filed with the IRS. In total, Joles did not report more than $1 million in Rock Hard Paving receipts. Joles is scheduled to be sentenced at a later date and faces a maximum penalty of three years in prison for filing a false tax return. He also faces a period of supervised release, monetary penalties, and restitution. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. U.S. Attorney David Clay Fowlkes for the Western District of Arkansas and Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department's Tax Division made the announcement. IRS-Criminal Investigation is investigating the case. Assistant Chief Greg Tortella and Trial Attorney Isaiah Boyd, III of the Tax Division are prosecuting the case.
