Man with pimping past pleads guilty to $1.5M tax fraud in Fresno, feds say
A Fresno man with a history of trafficking minors into underage sex work pleaded guilty Monday to $1.5 million in tax fraud, federal prosecutors said.
Marice Curry, 35, gave his plea to filing false federal income tax returns, U.S. Attorney Eric Grant announced.
He filed at least 51 false returns ranging from about $5,000 to $40,000, and all but a handful of the tax forms were filed from his Fresno home, according to court records.
Curry used a refundable fuel tax credit for businesses to get the money after filing the returns around May 2023, records show.
Curry agreed to forfeit numerous gold coins, silver bars and two gold chains with diamond pendants as part of his case, records show. The items were seized sometime after his arrest and included a pendant that said “cold boy” and another the federal court records described as a “Michael Jordan ‘in my bag’ pendant.”
The court records said he purchased the precious metals and jewelry because he believed they would hold their value better than the US dollar.
Curry could be sentenced up to three years and given a $100,000 fine, the federal prosecutors said. His sentencing is May 26.
He previously pleaded guilty in Orange County for pimping and pandering two teen girls in Costa Mesa in 2016, according to records. He was sentenced to five years in state prison.
