Louisville Man Pleads Guilty to Structuring Bank Deposits, Forfeits $129,884

LOUISVILLE, KY—Hatem D. Kaisi, age 41, of Louisville, Kentucky, pleaded guilty on November 21, 2009, to a felony Information filed by the United States Attorney charging him with structuring bank deposits to evade federal reporting requirements, United States Attorney Candace G. Hill of the Western District of Kentucky announced today.

According to the Information filed in the case, Kaisi structured U.S. currency deposits into his U.S. Bank account in an attempt to evade the filing of a currency transaction report. As a basis of his guilty plea, Kaisi admitted to breaking up his currency deposit of $12,110 into two smaller deposits of $7,410 and $4,700 on September 24, 2007. He admitted that the reason he made the deposits in this manner was to evade the federal currency transaction reporting requirement. He agreed to forfeit $129,884 as money involved in structuring currency deposits. Additionally, he agreed to cooperate with the IRS in the determination of his individual and business taxable income for the tax years 2005-07. He owns Automax of Louisville Supercenter.

Federal law requires every domestic financial institution to file a currency transaction report with the Internal Revenue Service when that institution is involved in a transaction for the payment, receipt, or transfer of over $10,000 in cash. “Structuring” a transaction to evade the federal reporting requirement is illegal. Structuring refers to the breaking up of a single transaction above the reporting threshold into two or more separate transactions for the purpose of evading a financial institution’s reporting requirement.

The case is being prosecuted by Special Assistant United States Attorney Khalid A. Kahloon and it was investigated jointly by the FBI, IRS, and Immigrations and Customs Service (ICE).

The plea was entered before Judge Charles R. Simpson, III, United States District Court, Louisville, Kentucky. The maximum potential penalties include 5 years’ imprisonment, a $250,000 fine, and 3 years’ supervised release. There is no parole in the federal system.

Kaisi is scheduled to be sentenced before Judge Simpson on March 23, 2010, at 11:00 a.m., in Louisville, Kentucky.