Tampa, Florida - United States Attorney A. Lee Bentley, III announces that a federal jury today found Marcus Lowe guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, theft of government funds, and aggravated identity theft; wire fraud; theft of government funds; and aggravated identity theft. He faces a maximum penalty of 5 years for the conspiracy count, 20 years for the wire fraud count, 10 years on each of the two theft counts, to be followed by a mandatory consecutive term of at least two years in federal prison for the aggravated identity theft counts. His sentencing hearing has not yet been scheduled. Lowe was indicted on December 4, 2014.
According to evidence presented at trial, Lowe worked as a Manatee County Probation Officer at the Manatee County Jail in 2012. As a result of that job, he had access to the personal identifying information of numerous inmates. He provided that information to other co-conspirators who, in turn, used those identities to file false and fraudulent income tax returns with the IRS. The attempted loss to the government from the fraudulent tax returns charged in the indictment exceeded $74,000.
This case was investigated by Internal Revenue Service - Criminal Investigation. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Jay L. Hoffer.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
