Portland, Maine: United States Attorney Thomas E. Delahanty II announced today that
John W. Price, 58, of Kittery, Maine pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court to structuring
over $157,000 in cash transactions to evade federal cash transaction reporting requirements.
Under federal law, financial institutions that dispense more than $10,000 in cash to a
customer are required to report the transaction to the Internal Revenue Service
(IRS). Structuring occurs when a customer breaks up cash withdrawals into multiple increments
of less than $10,000, to avoid the cash transaction reporting requirement.
Court records reveal that between 2008 and 2010, Price, the owner of J.P.’s Shellfish, a
seafood distributor in Eliot, Maine, directed his employees who withdrew cash from the J.P.’s
Shellfish business bank account to pay for lobsters not to withdraw more than $10,000 in cash at
any one time, so as to avoid the cash transaction reporting requirement.
Price faces up to 5 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each of the 12 counts. He will
be sentenced after the completion of a presentence investigation report by the United States
Probation Office.
The charges are the result of a collaborative investigation conducted by the IRS, the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Office of Law Enforcement, and the Knox
County Sheriff’s Office.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
