Dad and his daughter got millions from IRS after claiming to win lottery, authorities say

A Broward County father and daughter claimed the government owed them $175 million in tax refunds on their lottery winnings. The IRS paid them $3.4 million before the agency realized the pair had never purchased a winning ticket, prosecutors say.

Now, the pair, who say they’re “aboriginal indigenous Moorish Americans” immune to government authority, are on trial in a Palm Beach federal courtroom accused of tax fraud.

Court documents allege that Danielle Takeila Edmonson, 35, of Boynton, and Kenneth Roger Edmonson, 51, of Oakland Park, began filing a series of bogus tax returns in 2015. RELATED: Man gets 40 years for fake legal filings »

That year, prosecutors allege, Danielle Edmonson claimed an unspecified amount of lottery winnings, and managed to get the IRS to pay her $239,700. With her allegedly ill-gotten refunds, Danielle Edmonson bought a BMW and took out $60,000 from the bank in cash.

The following year, the woman — who court filings describe as a master’s in business graduate — decided to ask the IRS to pay her over $80 million in returns on over $141 million of supposed income.

“Your demand has no legal validity and is not payable through any federal agency,” the IRS replied in a letter quoted in court documents. “Your scheme appears to be akin to a fraud.”

But the revenue service’s remonstrance didn’t slow Dainelle Edmonson. The following year, 2016, she got almost $2.5 million out of the agency in what prosecutors allege are fraudulent filings. And the following year, 2017, she asked for $9 million.

(Excerpt) Read more at orlandosentinel.com