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Team Penske star is charged with failing to pay more than $5 million in taxes over a four-year period, authorities said. His sister, Kati Castroneves, and his lawyer, Allan Miller, are accused of assisting him in the alleged tax-evasion scheme.
The three have been indicted for conspiracy "for the purpose of impeding, impairing, obstructing, and defeating the lawful government functions of the Internal Revenue Service."

An example charge claims that Helio tried to pass off $2 million he received from a Brazilian trading company as earning only $200,000 in income.

Each charge of conspiracy and tax evasion carry a maximum punishment of five years in federal prison.
this sucks :(

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For some reason the Federal Government loves to prosecute high profile cases only. I know when I underpaid my taxes once the IRS sent me a notice giving me a certain time period in which to pay the owed amount. Here in SC a State Trooper was aquitted of allegedly hitting a suspect with his cruiser. Of course since it made national news, the Justice Department just HAD to prosecute. Of course he jury saw through this ploy and did the right thing. Look at the criminal action in the stock market and do any of these guys get prosecuted? No. Martha Stewart's more famous. This is just another case of some over zealous prosecutor looking for a feather in his cap. I'm willing to bet that the prosecutor in this case is some bitter, washed up, two bit attourney looking for some validitation in his useless, boring, insignifcant life. Most prosecutors in this country could'nt cut it as real lawyers and would put their own mother on trial it it won them a conviction. I have this picture in my mind of Helio's prosecutor as some failure of a lawyer who's only pleasure in life is gay porn and loves goats.
Rob, your ending sentence is my nominee for ICG's comment of the month! :-D
Just got a call from a major TV race announcer--Helio is in a world of hurt and there is a possibility of Sam Hornish returning, at least temporarily, to help Penske out. And just as some poster said on Talkback, it centers around him not telling the truth under oath--that is the BIG concern--like Martha Stewart. I feel bad for Helio--if we have seen the last of Helio, it will be a Huge loss.
It's making me sick. I mean, now Helio can't even leave the country so when we all watch the Australia race at the end of the month Helio won't be there. Like Wilsonfan said, it will be a huge loss if we have seen the last of him. I will miss singing to him in the autograph line. That was always a lot of fun and Helio got a kick out of it, jumping up and down and dancing while my sisters and I sang to him. It was fun. However, I just think maybe Helio got some bad lawyering advice. Then again, what do I really know? I didn't think Helio or his sister were capable of this.
Actually he's very fortunate to be allowed to travel within the US. Usually when charged with a felony your not allowed to leave the state and, in some cases ,county in which you reside. After reading the indictment I agree with you this is probably a bad case of lawyering. Like I said earlier I can't see any celebrity in this day and age even knowing the exact amount of money they take in lt alone keep track of it. People in charge of other people's money get caught with their hand in the cookie jar all the time. It looks like all Helio told the tax people is what his lawyer told him to say and seeing how the lawyer is in this up to his eyeballs, he has nothing to lose by letting his client take take fall as well. With all the corrupt bankers, politicans, wall street CEOs, and war profiteers, the IRS could take in billions prosecuting them,but since they line the lawmakers pockets, everything is glossed over and as the case recently, given billions in tax dollars to operate business as usual.
I've been turning over the idea in my mind that perhaps Helio really didn't know what was going on behind his back. I can see someone in his position naively assuming everything was hunky dory. It's a longshot, but it could be the case.

But, having said that, even if it were proven that was the case, I don't think the IRS is going to buy ignorance of your personal finances as a viable excuse. It's going to be really interesting to see how this plays out...but given other recent cases with the IRS involving celebs not paying taxes (Richard Hatch of Survivor, Wesley Snipes to name a couple), I have a bad feeling about this for Helio. The IRS likes to make examples of people in the public eye.
I'm just happy that Helio can still race in Australia. I'm not a Sam fan so I didn't particularly watn to see him in the #3 car. I wish Helio all the best and really hope things get turned around soon because this isn't looking good for him. Thanks for all the updates.

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