Jack A. Taylor, 68, a resident of Rolling Springs, Ky., pleaded guilty today to producing child pornography and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Taylor, appearing before U.S. District Court Judge David F. Hamilton in Indianapolis, was also ordered to serve a lifetime of supervised release following completion of his prison term, forfeit all items seized during the investigation that were used to commit his offense, and to pay $4,000 in restitution to his victim.

The Department of Justice today filed a lawsuit against the Board of Education of the City of Chicago (Board), alleging pregnancy discrimination in employment against former elementary school teacher Traci Meziere.

A federal district court in Tennessee has permanently barred Chattanooga resident Demita Brown-Watkins from preparing federal income tax returns for others. Brown-Watkins agreed to the civil injunction order. According to the government complaint, Brown-Watkins ran her tax-preparation business through two companies—Fastax and Rapid Tax Service—and advertised the “largest refund in town.”

Rodrick Williams, a former tax return preparer from District Heights, Md., was sentenced to 24 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Roger W. Titus for preparing false tax returns for customers.

Three former Atlanta Police Department (APD) officers were sentenced to prison today by Chief U.S. District Judge Julie E. Carnes on a charge of conspiracy to violate civil rights resulting in death, arising from the fatal police shooting of Kathryn Johnston, a 92-year old Atlanta woman.

The United States has sued Robert Cusenza, a West Palm Beach tax return preparer, seeking to bar him permanently from the tax preparation business. The government’s complaint asks the court to order Cusenza to stop preparing returns and to turn over his customer list to the Justice Department.

The United States has filed suit against a Jacksonville, Fla., tax return preparer, seeking to shut down her business. According to the government complaint, Shirley Clark, who operates the Nichet Corp., has prepared at least 1,250 federal tax returns for her customers from 2004 until 2007 and, on those returns, Clark has claimed nearly $750,000 in fraudulent fuel tax credits.

A federal court has permanently barred Harold Mette of Bradenton, Fla., from preparing federal income tax returns for others. Mette, who has a Ph.D. degree and calls his business “The Tax Doctor,” consented to the permanent injunction order, which was entered by U.S. District Judge Richard A. Lazzara in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

An employee of a Sewell, N.J., company that provided temporary electrical utilities pleaded guilty today to participating in a fraud conspiracy at an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)-designated Superfund site in New Jersey.

The United States has filed a lawsuit to block KV Pharmaceutical Company, its subsidiaries, ETHEX Corp. and Ther-Rx Corp., and its principal officers from making and distributing adulterated and unapproved drugs. At the same time, KV agreed to the injunction in a consent decree.

The United States has sued tax return preparers in Placerville, Calif., and Columbia, S.C., seeking to bar them from preparing federal tax returns for others. According to the government complaints in the two cases, Teresa Marty of Pollock Pines, Calif., and Winston Able of Blythewood, S.C., prepare federal income tax returns for their customers that claim fraudulent tax refunds.

A grand jury in the District of Columbia returned a three-count indictment today charging a former staff member in the U.S. House of Representatives with corruption offenses. Fraser C. Verrusio, 39, was charged by the grand jury with conspiring to accept an illegal gratuity, accepting an illegal gratuity, and making a false statement in failing to report his receipt of gifts from a lobbyist and the lobbyist’s client on his 2003 financial disclosure form.

Carl Courtright III, of Granite City, Ill., was convicted today on child pornography and bank fraud charges in the Southern District of Illinois following a five-day jury trial. The federal jury convicted Courtright of one count of production of child pornography, two counts of possession of child pornography, one count of receipt of child pornography, as well as one count of bank fraud.

Japanese electronics manufacturer Hitachi Displays Ltd., agreed to plead guilty and pay a $31 million fine for its role in a conspiracy to fix prices in the sale of Thin Film Transistor-Liquid Crystal Display panels (TFT-LCD) sold to Dell Inc.

Marshall E. Sanders, an attorney based in Vicksburg, Miss., was sentenced to 18 months in prison for failure to file tax returns by Magistrate Judge James C. Sumner. In addition, Judge Sumner ordered Sanders to pay restitution to the IRS of $1,025,453.

Five U.S. defendants convicted for their activity in a global child pornography trafficking enterprise were sentenced today in the Northern District of Florida. The defendants had pled to multiple charges, including engaging in a child exploitation enterprise; conspiracy to advertise, transport, ship, receive and possess child pornography; advertising child pornography; transporting child pornography; and receiving child pornography.

Building upon the successes of earlier efforts, the Department today announced the opening in Bangkok of a regional conference of approximately 100 key law enforcement and industry officials from more than a dozen nations with the goal of strengthening international cooperation in fighting large-scale intellectual property crimes.

A federal court has permanently barred Raymond A. Renfrow of Elm City, N.C., from preparing federal income tax returns for others. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina entered the civil injunction order, which also stops Renfrow from promoting a tax fraud scheme that used sham trusts to falsely deduct customers’ non-deductible personal expenses.

Beverly L. Masek, a former elected member of the Alaska House of Representatives, pleaded guilty today to conspiracy to commit bribery.  Masek pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Ralph Beistline in Anchorage to one count of conspiracy to commit bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds.

Four men have been arrested by special agents of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as the result of an undercover investigation into the illegal killing and trade of bald and golden eagles and other protected birds. The men are charged in four complaints with alleged violations of the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and the Lacey Act.

The United States has sued a Fort Richey, Fla., tax preparer, Frank Lighty, and his tax-preparation firm – Lighty & seeking to bar them permanently from the tax preparation business. The civil injunction suit was filed in Tampa with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

The United States has asked a federal court in Savannah, Ga., to permanently bar Ophelia Kelley of Vidalia, Ga., from preparing federal income tax returns for others. According to the government complaint, Kelley operates two return preparation firms in Vidalia – Kelley Tax Service, and City and Country Girl Tax Service.

The government has filed two lawsuits against the Union Pacific Railroad Company for allegedly failing to prevent the use of its rail cars to smuggle large quantities of narcotics into the United States. The complaints, filed in San Diego and Houston, seek more than $37 million in monetary penalties. The government alleges the rail cars were brought across the border at the ports of entry at Calexico, Calif., and Brownsville, Texas.

A member of La Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, was sentenced today to 25 years in prison and five years of supervised release for his participation in a racketeering enterprise. Manuel Marquez, a/k/a “Morro,” was sentenced in Nashville, Tenn., by Chief Judge Todd J. Campbell of the Middle District of Tennessee.

A federal court has shut down two Dallas tax preparers during the height of tax-filing season. Chief Judge Sidney Fitzwater of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas signed a temporary restraining order barring Ethel Washington from preparing any tax returns. The court has also permanently barred Washington’s former employer, Tina Preston, and her firm, The Preston Group & Associates Inc., from preparing federal tax returns.

Edward B. Bartoli, a Clearwater, Fla., resident and former attorney, was sentenced to 10 years in prison by U.S. District Judge Charles R. Norgle of Chicago. Bartoli is the last of six defendants to be sentenced after they were convicted of various tax crimes in May 2008. Prior to his conviction, Bartoli was a founder of Aegis and its legal director.

Alberto Goachet, 67, a political consultant and aide to former Puerto Rico Sen. Jorge De Castro Font, was sentenced today to three months in prison, three months of home detention and three years of supervised release. Goachet pleaded guilty on Dec. 4, 2008, to a one-count information charging him with conspiring with De Castro Font and others to launder money provided by a Puerto Rico businessman to De Castro Font.

The Department has reached agreement with New York officials to help ensure that military service members and other U.S. citizens living overseas have the opportunity to vote in the state’s March 31, 2009, special election in the 20th Congressional District.

Two former National Century Financial Enterprises (NCFE) executives were sentenced today for their roles in a scheme to deceive investors about the financial health of NCFE. NCFE, formerly based in Dublin, Ohio, was one of the largest healthcare finance companies in the United States until it filed for bankruptcy in November 2002.

A federal grand jury in San Francisco returned an indictment today charging an executive at Hitachi Displays Ltd. with participating in a global conspiracy to fix the prices of Thin Film Transistor-Liquid Crystal Display (TFT-LCD) panels sold to Dell Inc.

The United States has brought suit in federal court against Gayle Lemmon of Humboldt, Iowa. The lawsuit seeks to bar her and her firm from preparing federal tax returns for others. According to the government complaint in the case, Lemmon’s firm, Gayle’s Bookkeeping and Tax Service Inc., prepares federal income tax returns for customers that unlawfully understate tax liabilities by claiming improper deductions for the business use of the home and for non-deductible personal expenses.

The United States has sued four Certified Public Accounts (CPA), 27 tax preparers and one other individual, seeking to bar them from promoting an alleged tax scam involving bogus income tax credits claimed for sham sales of methane from landfills.

A former contract employee of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and a dirt, sand and gravel subcontractor were both convicted on charges of conspiracy and bribery in connection with a $16 million hurricane protection project for the reconstruction of the Lake Cataouatche Levee, south of New Orleans.

Nora R. Dannehy, Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut, and other federal officials announced that Hassan Abu-Jihaad, formerly known as Paul R. Hall, 33, of Phoenix, Arizona, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Mark R. Kravitz in New Haven to 120 months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for disclosing previously classified information relating to the national defense.

A physicist in Newport News, Va., was sentenced to 51 months in prison today for illegally exporting space launch technical data and defense services to the People’s Republic of China and offering bribes to Chinese government officials. Shu Quan-Sheng, 68, a native of China, naturalized U.S. citizen and Ph.D. physicist, was sentenced by Judge Henry C. Morgan, Jr. in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Norfolk Division.

Latin Node Inc. (Latinode), a privately held Florida corporation, pleaded guilty today to violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) in connection with improper payments in Honduras and Yemen. At a hearing before U.S. District Judge Paul Courtney Huck in the Southern District of Florida, Latinode pleaded guilty to a one-count information charging a criminal violation of the FCPA’s anti-bribery provisions.

Three international airline companies—Luxembourg-based Cargolux Airlines International S.A., Japan-based Nippon Cargo Airlines Co. Ltd. (NCA), and Korea-based Asiana Airlines Inc.—have each agreed to plead guilty and pay criminal fines totaling $214 million for conspiring to fix prices in the air cargo industry. In addition, Asiana was charged with fixing the passenger fares charged on flights from the United States to Korea.

U.S. District Court Judge Robert W. Gettlemen entered an order barring tax preparers, Michael J. Singleton and his wife, Ladonna Singleton, from preparing federal tax returns for others. The court’s ruling came after the Singletons failed to defend against the government’s allegations.

A federal court has barred a Chicago tax preparation firm, El Caminante, Inc. and its principal operator, Maria Colica, from preparing federal income tax returns claiming false tax credits. The company and Colica agreed to the injunction. The Government civil injunction complaint filed in the case alleged that Colica fraudulently claimed fuel tax credits for customers who were not entitled to them.

Invista will pay a $1.7 million civil penalty and spend up to an estimated $500 million to correct self-reported environmental violations discovered at facilities in seven states. The company disclosed more than 680 violations of water, air, hazardous waste, emergency planning and preparedness, and pesticide regulations to EPA after auditing 12 facilities it acquired from DuPont in 2004.

Tax return preparer Lawrence Sperling pleaded guilty today to aiding in the preparation of false tax returns. Sperling was scheduled to begin trial on April 14, 2009 before Judge Deborah Chasanow in Greenbelt, Md. According to the indictment and the plea agreement, Sperling knowingly prepared tax returns for his clients that contained false and fraudulent items, including inflated medial expenses, charitable contributions, miscellaneous employment-related expenses, and child care credits.

Alexander Tajong, a Bronx, N.Y.-based return preparer, was charged today with twenty counts of willfully aiding and assisting in the preparation and filing of false income tax returns for 10 of his clients during the 2002 and 2003 tax years.

Rene Soliz of Alice, Texas, pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court in Corpus Christi, Texas, to a violation of the Lacey Act for attempting to receive fifteen Tanzanian leopard tortoises that were transported into the United States in violation of a law, regulation or treaty, specifically, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

WASHINGTON and PENSACOLA, Fla. – Six U.S. defendants convicted for their activity in a global child pornography trafficking enterprise were sentenced today in the Northern District of Florida, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Rita M. Glavin, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Florida Thomas F. Kirwin and FBI Executive Assistant Director J. Stephen Tidwell announced.

An Iraqi-born Dutch citizen was sentenced to 25 years in prison today for conspiring to murder Americans overseas, including by planting roadside bombs targeting U.S. soldiers in Fallujah, Iraq, and by demonstrating on video how these explosives would be detonated to destroy American vehicles and their occupants.

A federal court has permanently barred Donald Morris of Bloomfield, Conn., from preparing federal income tax returns for others. Morris consented to the permanent injunction order, which was entered by U.S. District Court Judge Jane C. Hall in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut.

Six energy companies, in three settlements, have agreed to install pollution control equipment at a cost of over $6 million to comply with the Clean Air Act at their natural gas producing facilities in the Uinta Basin, near Vernal, Utah. The facilities are located on the Uintah &

A federal court in Dallas has permanently barred a Garland, Texas, man from preparing federal tax returns for others. Lucky Ngo, who operated “Lucky’s Translation and Tax Service” and “Water Inn,” prepared over 6,100 federal tax returns for customers since 2004, according to the government complaint filed in the civil injunction case. Ngo agreed to the permanent injunction order.

Thomas L. Hallock, a commercial fisherman licensed in Maryland, was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Md., to 12 months in prison, for illegally overfishing striped bass also known as rockfish. He was also fined $4,000 and ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $40,000 to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to the benefit of the Chesapeake Bay Striped Bass Restoration Account.

Jerry R. Williamson, a promoter of the American Rights Litigators/Guiding Light of God Ministries (ARL) formerly based in Florida, pleaded guilty today to mail fraud. Williamson appeared today before Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. in Washington, D.C., and admitted that he that he sent a fictitious “Bill of Exchange” purporting to be drawn upon the U.S. Treasury to the Bureau of Land Management of the Department of the Interior.