On April 20, 2009, in St. Paul, Minn., Kara Kristine Sommer, of Burnsville, Minn., was sentenced to 18 months in prison and three years of supervised release for failing to pay the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) payroll taxes from employees of a construction business. According to her plea agreement, Sommer admitted withholding or causing to be withheld amounts for federal income taxes and Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) taxes from the wages of employees of Frontier Construction, Inc., located in Burnsville, from April 1, 2002, through Sept. 30, 2006.
Sommer was responsible for accounting, payroll management and income taxes for Frontier Construction. Her duties included withholding federal payroll taxes from employee paychecks and paying over the withheld taxes to the IRS. From April 1, 2002, to September 30, 2006, Sommer deducted and collected federal income taxes and FICA taxes from the taxable wages of Frontier employees. Sommer admitted that during the tax years of 2001 through 2005, she willfully failed to account for and to pay over to the IRS a total amount of taxes of nearly $200,000.