Date: Aug. 14, 2024

Contact: [email protected]

MISSOULA - The owner of a Bozeman construction company who admitted not paying to the IRS employee-related taxes of more than $800,000 was sentenced today to federal prison and fined $75,000, U.S. Attorney Jesse Laslovich said.

The defendant, Joseph Glen Dickey, owner of Alpine Customs, Inc., pleaded guilty in April to failure to truthfully account for and pay over withholding and FICA taxes, a felony, and failure to file employer's quarterly return and pay tax, a misdemeanor.

U.S. District Judge Dana L. Christensen sentenced Dickey to one year and one day in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. The court also fined him $75,000 and ordered $270,807 restitution, which is the remaining amount owed after Dickey repaid some of his outstanding balance prior to sentencing.

The government alleged in court documents that Dickey owns Alpine Customs, Inc., a commercial construction company that has employed 60 or more individuals. Dickey acted as Alpine's general manager and exercised control over every aspect of the business, including approving company payments and overseeing company bank accounts. Alpine withheld payroll taxes from employees' paychecks, including federal income taxes and Social Security and Medicare taxes. Alpine also was required to make quarterly deposits of those payroll taxes and additional employer payroll contributions to the IRS.

Dickey did not timely deposit several employee or employer payroll taxes from 2018 to 2021. Dickey knew of the requirements and his bookkeepers and IRS officers repeatedly advised Dickey of these legal obligations. In total, Dickey failed to timely pay $803,374 in employer and employee payroll taxes.

The U.S. Attorney's Office prosecuted the case. The IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS CI) conducted the investigation.

CI is the criminal investigative arm of the IRS, responsible for conducting financial crime investigations, including tax fraud, narcotics trafficking, money-laundering, public corruption, healthcare fraud, identity theft and more. CI special agents are the only federal law enforcement agents with investigative jurisdiction over violations of the Internal Revenue Code, obtaining a more than a 90 percent federal conviction rate. The agency has 20 field offices located across the U.S. and 12 attaché posts abroad.