- General
- October 6, 2020
- 4 minutes read
John McAfee Charged With Tax Evasion
Photo credit: Gage Skidmore on Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons John McAfee, an infamous antivirus software pioneer and entrepreneur best…
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| Photo credit: Gage Skidmore on Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons |
John McAfee, an infamous antivirus software pioneer and entrepreneur best known for founding the eponymous software company McAfee Associates, has been indicted on charges on tax evasion by the US Justice Department, with allegations that he earned millions of dollars in income from promoting cryptocurrencies and doing consulting work among other things and failed to file tax returns from the years of 2014 to 2018. McAfee is alleged to have evaded tax liability by directing his income to be paid into bank accounts and cryptocurrency exchange accounts in the names of others. He’s also accused of attempting to evade the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) by concealing assets including a yacht, a vehicle, and real estate property in the names of others.
McAfee’s indictment by the U.S. Justice Department comes on the very same day the U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) issued a formal complaint against him, alleging that he promoted initial coin offerings (ICOs) and received millions of dollars in payments as a result but without disclosing that he was being paid to do so. The SEC alleges McAfee received Bitcoin and Ether worth over $11.6 million for promoting seven ICOs in 2017 and 2018 and also received $11.5 million in promoted tokens.
As to the charges, McAfee has been taken into custody by law enforcement in Spain and is now facing extradition to the United States. McAfee faces a maximum sentence of five years on each count of tax evasion he’s been charged with and a maximum sentence of one year on each count of willful failure to file a tax return along with monetary penalties. As usual, a defendant, McAfee in this case, stays presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.
