Beauty doctor Joel Mendez gets 2-4 yrs. for tax evasion

(Updated 9:37 p.m.) The Court of Tax Appeals has convicted beauty doctor Joel Mendez on two counts of tax evasion for failing to file income tax return in 2002 and for falsifying what he submitted in 2003. In a decision promulgated Wednesday, the court's Second Division said Mendez was "guilty beyond reasonable doubt" of those offenses. The court sentenced Mendez to a minimum one-year prison term to a maximum of two years for the first offense. He was also meted and the same sentence for the second offense. The tax court also fined him P10,000 for each offense. Because a convict cannot serve multiple sentences simultaneously, Mendez faces two to four years behind bars. GMANews.TV tried to contact Mendez through one of his clinics but was not able to get his side on the matter.
Mendez is the sole proprietor of Weigh Less Center, Mendez Body and Face Salon and Spa, and Mendez Body and Face Skin Clinic. These have "several branches" in Quezon City, Makati City, San Fernando City in Pampanga, and Dagupan City in Pangasinan. The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) had charged Mendez for violation of Section 255 of the 1997 National Internal Revenue Code. In 2002, Mendez did not file his income tax return, defrauding the government of P1.5 million, according to court records. A year later, he willfully failed to "supply the correct and accurate information" in his ITR [income tax return] by making it appear that his earnings only came from his Dagupan branches. The falsification defrauded the government of P2.1 million, the BIR said in its complaint before the tax court. Justice Secretary Leila De Lima said in July 2010 the public could expect the Finance Department and the BIR to intensify the drive against tax evaders. After filing the first-ever tax evasion case under the new administration against a pawnshop owner, De Lima said: "This will be the beginning of a series of successive filing of cases of anti-smuggling and anti-tax evasion. As you know, one of the priorities is to intensify anti-smuggling and anti-tax evasion, and one best way is to intensify and maximize the filing of cases." Meanwhile, De Lima said she has ordered her prosecutors to fast-track the resolution of at least 12 high-profile tax evasion complaints — some of them against celebrities — that have been pending at the department since 2005. At a news briefing, De Lima said the list was based on the BIR's request to have the tax evasion complaints acted upon because these were already deemed for resolution. However, the DOJ prosecutors have yet to act on them. "I am now directing the prosecutors concerned to immediately resolve them, because I understand, these are submitted for resolution already," said De Lima. She said the prosecutors must submit the resolutions before the end of January or they would face sanctions. "We have this policy now that if they miss the deadlines, we'll be constrained to defer payment of allowances and other benefits as an initial course of action," said De Lima.— LBG/VS GMANews.TV