Former Broker Susan Patrick Sentenced to 15 Months in Prison

RADIO ONLINE | Tuesday, February 20, 2024 | 3:44pm CT

Susan K. Patrick

Susan K. Patrick, co-founder of Patrick Communications alongside her spouse Larry Patrick, a former U.S. media brokerage firm, is sentenced to a 15-month prison term by a federal district court in Maryland. The conviction came as a result of her guilty plea to charges of deliberately filing a false tax return. U.S. District Judge George L. Russell III, presiding over the case in Maryland, not only imposed the prison sentence but also mandated a year of supervised release for Patrick and ordered her to pay a substantial restitution sum of more than $3.8 million to the U.S. government.

Patrick admitted to tax evasion in September, 2023 and stepped down from her role at Patrick Communications following her admission of concealing $10 million in personal income derived from the firm. After applying deductions, this undeclared income totaled $9.5 million over a span of three years, which she failed to report to the IRS.

According to federal prosecutors in Maryland, from 2012 to 2015, Susan Patrick engaged an accounting firm to prepare her and the company's tax returns, which were subsequently not filed with the IRS. When later confronted about not filing her taxes, she falsely asserted that she had, providing fabricated returns that excluded the $9.5 million income from the brokerage firm.

In her public statement back in September, Patrick expressed remorse for the distress and embarrassment her actions have caused to her family, friends, and professional colleagues. She emphasized that her partners at Patrick Communications had no knowledge of her fraudulent tax activities, praising their continued professionalism and integrity. She also extended her apologies to the employees of Legend Communications, clarifying that the tax issue was unrelated to the broadcasting company.