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TAX TROUBLE IN MEDIAPOLIS

August 24, 2007

A southeast Iowa restauranteur may be wishing he had been more careful with his taxes. From the Burlington HawkEye:

Arraignment for a Sperry man accused of tax evasion will have to wait until next month after a judge granted a continuance last week based on the request of attorneys who stated that they have negotiated a plea and would want to present oral arguments in open court.

Craig Lynn Murguia, 58, 19587 115th Ave., president of Country Horizons Inc., a corporation that operates two Mediapolis restaurants -- Apron Strings and Tumbleweed which was later known as Iowa Buffalo Company -- is charged with one count of tax evasion. The charge stems from him allegedly collecting withholding taxes from his employees but failing to file government tax returns or deposit the taxes he took out of his employees' paychecks.

It looks like he may have been skipping out on taxes across the board:

Murguia was arrested May 24 after a recent audit, completed by an agent of the Iowa Department of Revenue, found that from Jan. 1, 2002 to June 30, 2003, the former underpaid his sales tax, local-option sales tax and school local-option tax which amounted to a combined total of $14,454.

The report also says Mr. Murguia may be way behind on income tax filings, as far back as 1990. If convicted, Mr. Murguia faces both likely financial ruin and a prison sentence.

The Moral: Just because you haven't been caught yet doesn't mean you won't be. The longer the evasion goes on, the more likely you are to get in trouble.

Related: First, Stop Digging

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