Crime & Safety

Art Dealer From Sands Point Arrested for Tax Fraud, Hiding $12.5 Million

Glafira Rosales allegedly hid millions from the IRS from sales of artwork purported to be painted by famous artists.

An art dealer from Long Island was arrested this week for filing false tax returns and failing to disclose a foreign bank account to the IRS. 

Glafira Rosales of Sands Point failed to report the receipt of at least $12.5 earned from the sale of works purported to be by celebrated abstract expressionist artists, according to prosecutors. Most of the income was received in a bank account in Spain that Rosales hid from and failed to disclose to the IRS.

“Rosales gave new meaning to the phrase ‘artful dodger’ by avoiding taxes on millions of dollars in income from dealing in fake artworks for fake clients,” said Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York prosecuting the case. "Her arrest shows that no matter how clever the scheme, attempts to hide income from the government to avoid paying taxes on that income will be discovered and prosecuted.”

FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge George Venizelos said Rosales committed tax fraud in falsely reporting that she was selling art on behalf of clients.

"In truth, those clients were just part of the picture she painted to perpetrate her multi-million dollar scheme," said Venizelos.

Rosales, 56, was arrested in Sands Point Wednesday and was presented in Manhattan federal court. 

Rosales’s lawyer, Steven R. Kartagener, said, “Glafira Rosales fully intends to defend herself against these charges and she is confident that when all the facts become known she will be vindicated,” according to a New York Times report.

On each of the three false tax return charges, she faces a maximum sentence of three years in prison, a maximum term of three years of supervised release, and a maximum fine of $100,000. On each of the five willful failure to file FBAR charges, she faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison, a maximum term of five years of supervised release, and a maximum fine of $250,000.


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