HARRISBURG – Agents from the Attorney General’s office have charged two men with theft for failing to pay nearly $350,000 in Pennsylvania taxes. The men were the owners of four hotels in Pennsylvania.
Attorney General Tom Corbett said that Charles Morais, 47, and Sunil Mir, 36, both of Marietta, GA, are the owners of Kronos Hotels, LLC, which owned hotels all across the United States, including hotels in Allegheny, Clearfield, Lancaster and York counties.
The charges state that between 2008 and 2009, the defendants failed to pay $310,849 in state sales tax and $37,020 that was withheld from their employees’ paychecks.
“These defendants are charged with stealing nearly $350,000 in sales and withholding taxes,” Corbett said. “Their alleged criminal conduct could increase the tax burden on the hard-working and honest business people who follow the law.”
According to the criminal complaint, the total amount of unpaid sales tax and withholding tax for the four Pennsylvania hotels was nearly $347,869. The four Pennsylvania hotels owned by Kronos Hotels were:
· The Holiday Inn Greentree, 401 Holiday Drive, Pittsburgh;
· The Holiday Inn, 334 Arsenal Road, York;
· The Holliday Inn, 521 Greenfield St, Lancaster, and;
· The Clarion Hotel, 1896 Rich Highway, Dubois
They owe $95,348 in state sales taxes on the Clarion Hotel in Dubois, $126,302 on the Holiday Inn Greentree in Pittsburgh, $56,921 on the Holiday Inn in Lancaster and $32,278 on the Holiday Inn in York.
In addition, Morais and Mir face charges in connection with nearly $5,500 and $5,700 in unpaid Pennsylvania personal income tax respectively.
Morais and Mir are each charged with four counts of theft by failure to make required disposition of funds received; a third-degree felony carrying a maximum penalty of seven years in prison and a $15,000 fine each. Both defendants are also charged with 24 counts of willful failure to remit sales tax, and two counts of willful failure to file sales tax returns; both are ungraded misdemeanors and carry a maximum penalty of one year in prison and a $1,000 fine each.
The defendants will be preliminarily arraigned before Dauphin County Magisterial District Judge Lowell Witmer.
The case will be prosecuted in Dauphin County by Senior Deputy Attorney General George Zaiser of the Attorney General’s Tax Crimes Unit.
Corbett thanked the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue for their assistance in the investigation.