On Friday, a Brandon woman pleaded guilty in federal court to defrauding her employer and being involved in a tax fraud conspiracy. She is facing a maximum penalty of 10 years in federal prison for both offenses.

Ms. Alesia Ann Spivey, 46, entered a plea to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud against her former employer, Jabil Circuit, Inc. (“Jabil Circuit”), and one count of conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service and theft of government funds.

According to the plea agreement, in 2010 and 2011, Ms. Spivey was employed in Jabil Circuit’s Global Mobility Group as a Global Mobility Coordinator and a Regional Relocation Program Administrator, in their St. Petersburg corporate offices.  Her job responsibilities in these positions included working with Jabil Circuit’s relocation manager, Weichert Relocation Resources, Inc. (“Weichert”), to assist Jabil Circuit’s employees with work-related changes in residence.

Beginning around August 2010, and continuing through October 2011, she conspired with various individuals to defraud Jabil Circuit by requesting relocation benefits for non-existent employees.  Ms. Spivey recruited various co-conspirators to pose as Jabil Circuit employees.

The conspirators, opened, maintained, and otherwise made their bank accounts available to receive fraudulently obtained relocation benefits.

Once a lump sum payment was made, the conspirators divided the fraud proceeds between themselves.  Ultimately, the conspirators defrauded Jabil Circuit out of $318,764.98 in relocation benefits and fees paid to furnish those benefits.

Pleads To Tax Fraud Conspiracy

Investigators said in a completely separate fraud scheme, between January and August 2012, Ms. Spivey engaged in a scheme with other individuals to file false income tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service in order to obtain fraudulent refunds. She and others reportedly conspired and carried out tax fraud by obtaining the means of identification of various persons, including the names, dates of birth, and social security numbers of such persons.

The identification was then used to prepare and electronically file approximately 217 false and fraudulent federal income tax returns.

In many cases, the individuals whose identities appeared on these fraudulent returns did not know Ms. Spivey and the others filing tax returns on their behalf.

The 217 fraudulent returns claimed were worth $1,554,493.00 in bogus tax refunds.  Ultimately, the IRS paid out $551,472.90 in refunds to the conspirators.