A former auditor at the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has been sentenced to three years in jail, after admitting to fraud and other offences.
The CRA reports that a former audit team leader with the organization, Jeffrey Granger, was sentenced to three years in jail in the Ontario Court of Justice. Back in November 2013, he pled guilty to fraud over $5,000, breach of trust, and accepting secret commissions. The CRA says that he received three years in jail for each count, to be served concurrently.
The agency says that the charges arose out of an investigation which found that Granger “attempted to influence the outcome of CRA audits for various land development and construction companies” in exchange for $1.1 million in secret commissions. In turn, the CRA says that he didn’t report the secret commissions, thereby defrauding the federal government of $630,546 in income and sales tax.
“The CRA has strong internal systems to safeguard data and identify improper access and we work with all of our employees and their unions to ensure that every worker shares these values. Canadians can feel confident in the protection of their information and in the fairness of the tax regime. Isolated incidents that may involve a single employee are certainly not representative of the honesty and integrity of the CRA and its employees,” said Vince Pranjivan, deputy assistant commissioner, Ontario region, CRA.