A nephew of the alleged mastermind behind the largest government theft case in the District’s history became the first defendant to be sentenced to prison Wednesday.
Ricardo Walters, 33, of Fort Washington, was ordered to serve six and a half years for helping to launder the more than $48 million that was stolen from the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue. Walters was taken into custody at the federal courthouse in Greenbelt to begin serving his sentence.
Walters, the nephew of former D.C. tax office manager Harriette Walters, owned a home cleaning business called Provident Home Services and opened a bank account in the business’s name where more than a dozen fraudulently obtained D.C. government checks totaling more than $5.4 million were deposited.
Ricardo Walters distributed $795,000 to himself in 18 transactions and made at least 16 transactions totaling $2.3 million to four co-conspirators.
Of the 13 accused co-conspirators, Walters is one of eight who have pleaded guilty in the scheme since it was publicly revealed by authorities in November. The scheme has involved a family and friends, an Internal Revenue Services supervisor and his wife, a bank worker, a real estate agent, a beauty salon business owner, a former casino dealer and a designer handbag sales clerk, authorities said.
Harriette Walters is in the D.C. jail awaiting trial.
The District’s tax scandal may stretch back as far as 1989 or even earlier, according to federal law enforcement officials. Over the years, the defendants allegedly created phony property tax returns and generated fraudulent checks totaling nearly $50 million, which were then deposited into sham corporate accounts, mostly in Maryland.
Federal authorities have seized luxuries including sports cars, jewelry, cash, designer bags and shoes, a $140,000 Bentley automobile, andhomes in D.C., Maryland and the Caribbean.
