A veterinary surgeon has been told that unless he makes all his accounts and documents available to the Revenue Commissioners, he could face a jail sentence.
The warning was given by Judge John Brophy at Dunshaughlin District Court yesterday where Joseph Neylon (54) and his wife Maureen, Beechwood Farm, Rooske Road, Dunboyne, Co Meath, each pleaded guilty to 20 charges relating to making incorrect tax returns between 1996 and 2003 and not keeping proper records.
The court was told they have already paid a €500,000 tax settlement to the Revenue but senior tax inspector Derek Coleman told the court he believed they could owe another €150,000.
In his evidence Mr Coleman told the judge that the couple had "not entirely" rectified matters with the Revenue Commissioners and he was still waiting for disclosure of certain documents.
Asked by the judge how the tax offences had been carried out, Mr Coleman said that money had initially been concealed in an undisclosed building society account and then in accounts in the Channel Islands and Isle of Man.
He said that in 1989 there was €184,000 in a building society account and that €152,000, or the equivalent of £100,000 sterling, had been put into an offshore account.
By 1997 the interest on the off-shore account came to €95,000 and, he told the court, none of the money involved had been disclosed.
In 1989 the couple set up Veterinary Clinical Trials Ltd, of which they were the sole directors, and it was involved in drug testing.
Unknown to the auditors, the Neylons had not recorded all sales and trading receipts in the books and most of it had gone into a building society account and then into British rental properties.
"It is very difficult to estimate the loss to the Revenue," Mr Coleman said, adding that a set of accounts had been prepared for the Revenue Commissioners but that when he sampled them he found cheques that had been lodged to bank accounts he did not know about.
He estimated there was another €52,000 income that was undisclosed.
The couple tried to avail of the 2004 scheme operated by the Revenue for the disclosure of off-shore accounts but were not entitled to because they were already under investigation.
Mr Coleman estimated they did this in an attempt to reduce the penalties by €87,000.
The €500,000 they already paid out was made up of €164,000 in taxes, €256,000 in interest and €77,000 in penalties, he said.
Cross-examined by Remy Farrell, defending, Mr Coleman agreed the Neylons had admitted the offences at an early stage and met with Revenue and made statements to them.
He agreed that as sole shareholders of the company, any fines imposed on it would come "out of their pockets".
In reply to Judge Brophy, Mr Farrell said that imprisonment would have a "devastating effect" on Mr Neylon and his family.
He said Mr Neylon was still working and carrying out drug tests as well as being involved as a volunteer with the Dublin Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
Judge Brophy told him he had clearly engaged in wrongful conduct.
State solicitor Michael Finnegan said there was still outstanding documentation and the judge said he would adjourn the case so that it could be produced.
He said that if Mr Neylon co-operated with the Revenue, "I'll go down the monetary route". That was based on him making a full disclosure to the Revenue Commissioners of outstanding documents.
Otherwise, he told Mr Farrell, "a suspended sentence hangs over his head".
He adjourned the case to April 18th next.