RAPID CITY, S.D. (AP) - Authorities say a former South Dakota state’s attorney convicted of tax evasion has once again failed to pay taxes.
Kenneth Orrock, 48, faces sentencing later this month after failing to pay $17,000 in federal taxes he collected from his employees at the Black Hills Patrol security agency in 2015. Orrock pleaded guilty in February and agreed to pay the IRS about $280,000, the Rapid City Journal reported .
The Rapid City resident was caught again July 21 on accusations that he hasn’t paid business taxes this year, which would be a violation of his conditional release. U.S. Marshals Service officials said this is the first time Orrock was arrested for tax evasion because he made his initial court appearance following a summons.
Court records show that at a court hearing Monday, Orrock said he failed to pay the security agency’s employment taxes in the first and second quarters of 2017.
His attorney, Stanton Anker, said those employment taxes have now been paid.
Federal prosecutors asked Magistrate Judge Daneta Wollmann to keep Orrock in jail until his sentencing because he was a flight risk, but Wollmann disagreed. The judge released Orrock from the Pennington County Jail on Monday as long as he provides the U.S. Attorney’s Office with proof that he’s making semimonthly payments to the IRS.
Orrock’s offense, willful failure to collect and pay over tax, is punishable by up to five years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine.
The state Supreme Court released a statement last week saying that Orrock has been disbarred “from the practice of law in all of the Court of South Dakota.” The judgment was effective July 19.
Orrock was a state’s attorney for Bennett County from 2013 until last year, when he lost the Republican primary to the current state’s attorney, Sarah Harris.
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Information from: Rapid City Journal, https://www.rapidcityjournal.com
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