{"id":21014,"date":"2020-11-09T15:38:21","date_gmt":"2020-11-09T12:38:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/shipping-executive-caught-in-sothebys-tax-scam\/21014\/"},"modified":"2020-11-09T15:38:21","modified_gmt":"2020-11-09T12:38:21","slug":"shipping-executive-caught-in-sothebys-tax-scam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/shipping-executive-caught-in-sothebys-tax-scam\/21014\/","title":{"rendered":"Shipping Executive Caught In Sotheby\u2019s Tax Scam"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<p>Attorney General Letitia James said Sotheby\u2019s helped the client, (<a href=\"https:\/\/rehs.com\/eng\/2020\/11\/more-hot-water-for-sothebys\/\">Issac Moises Sultan Cohen<\/a> of <a href=\"https:\/\/afsusa.us\">Atlantic Feeder Services USA<\/a>), obtain false tax exemption certificates known as resale certificates by letting him portray himself as an art dealer rather than as a collector.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2IeMb0u\">RELATED BOOK: Wooden Ships &amp; Iron Men: The Maritime Art of Thomas Hoyne Hardcover\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>James said this enabled the client, who<a href=\"https:\/\/afsusa.us\/current-feeder-service\/\"> runs a<span class=\"highlight\" data-qa-component=\"highlight-text\"> Caribbean<\/span>\u00a0feeder service<\/a> and lives mainly outside the US, to avoid sales taxes on more than $27 million of art he bought for personal use between 2010 and 2015, including for his Manhattan apartment.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>The complaint said Sotheby\u2019s accepted four resale certificates despite \u201coverwhelming\u201d evidence the purchases were for personal use, including when senior Sotheby\u2019s personnel visited the apartment \u201cto admire his artwork on the walls.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>In a statement, Sotheby\u2019s said it \u201cvigorously refutes the unfounded allegations made by the Attorney General, which are unsupported by both fact and law.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit was filed in a New York state court in Manhattan and seeks damages plus civil penalties for violations of the state\u2019s False Claims Act.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2IeMsk2\">RELATED BOOK: Tugboats of New York: An Illustrated History<\/a><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>It was filed two years after one of the client\u2019s companies, Porsal Equities, reached a $10.75 million settlement to resolve related state allegations over the use of resale certificates.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>\u201cMillionaires and billionaires cannot be allowed to evade taxes,\u201d James said in a statement. \u201cSotheby\u2019s violated the law and fleeced New York taxpayers out of millions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><em>(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Bill Berkrot and Rosalba O\u2019Brien, Reuterts)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>gCaptain<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Attorney General Letitia James said Sotheby\u2019s helped the client, (Issac Moises Sultan Cohen of Atlantic Feeder Services USA), obtain false tax exemption certificates known as resale certificates by letting him portray himself as an art dealer rather than as a collector. RELATED BOOK: Wooden Ships &amp; Iron Men: The Maritime Art of Thomas Hoyne Hardcover\u00a0 &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[2280,3492,13155,62,13154,4356],"class_list":["post-21014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marine-world","tag-caught","tag-executive","tag-scam","tag-shipping","tag-sothebys","tag-tax"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/21015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}