{"id":349283,"date":"2026-07-23T00:19:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T00:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/349283\/"},"modified":"2026-07-23T00:19:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T00:19:09","slug":"south-florida-man-pleads-guilty-to-tax-evasion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/349283\/","title":{"rendered":"South Florida man pleads guilty to tax evasion"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Florida man pleads guilty to tax evasion with business that provided internet to U.S. service members<\/p>\n

\"MalcolmMIAMI \u2014<\/p>\n

Video above: News and weather for Wednesday, July 22, 2026<\/p>\n

A South Florida resident accused of not paying millions of dollars in taxes decided whether he would fight federal charges.<\/p>\n

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, on Monday, July 20, Joseph Stewart, from Miami, pled guilty to one count of tax evasion.<\/p>\n

He was initially charged with seven counts of tax evasion and seven counts of filing false tax returns.<\/p>\n

The DOJ said between 2013 and 2018, Stewart earned more than $4.5 million in dividends from 50% ownership in a business that sold internet access to U.S. service members and contractors stationed on Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

Your neighborhood: Local coverage from WPBF 25 News<\/a><\/p>\n

During the same time period, Stewart also earned income from his 50% ownership of a separate business that sold internet access to soldiers stationed on Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.<\/p>\n

The DOJ said Stewart stopped filing timely tax returns with the Internal Revenue Service once he began receiving significant dividends from his business in 2013.<\/p>\n

The DOJ said Stewart filed a false affidavit with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services by attaching unfiled copies of federal tax returns when falsely attesting they were filed.<\/p>\n

Once Stewart received letters from the IRS in 2019, he hired a tax attorney and return preparers and falsely informed them that over $3.8 million in dividends he received in 2013 and 2018 were nontaxable loans.<\/p>\n

Stewart also said he did not know the other shareholders of the business.<\/p>\n

That false information led the tax professionals to draft false returns with the IRS, except for a 2013 tax return, which reported that Stewart owed $155,720 in taxes.<\/p>\n

Get the latest news updates with the WPBF 25 News app. You can download it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The DOJ said Stewart willfully failed to report around $4.62 million in income and caused a total tax loss to the United States of $1.57 million. <\/p>\n

“Joe Stewart apologizes to the court and the government and accepts responsibility for his misconduct,” Dennis G. Kainen, the attorney representing Stewart, told WPBF 25 News on Wednesday, July 22.<\/p>\n

Stewart is facing a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison, probation, monetary penalties and restitution. <\/p>\n

Sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 9.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"South Florida man pleads guilty to tax evasion with business that provided internet to U.S. service members MIAMI…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[558,7740,130480,45972,142928,28,30,29,17088,142927,20949,115,59410,142926,124939,142929,142930,2486,189],"class_list":["post-349283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-business","tag-count","tag-dividend","tag-doj","tag-evasion","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-internet","tag-joseph-stewart","tag-july","tag-news","tag-ownership","tag-south-florida-man-pleads-guilty-to-tax-evasion-on-business-that-provided-internet-to-servicemembers","tag-tax-attorney","tag-timely-tax-return","tag-u-s-servicemember","tag-wednesday","tag-wpbf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}