Drywaller gets prison for illegal activity here

ANCHORAGE — A federal judge in Anchorage gave a year-long prison sentence to a drywall contractor who failed to pay employment taxes and hired undocumented aliens while doing jobs in the Mat-Su and Anchorage areas, according to a recent release from the U.S. Attorney’s office in Anchorage.

Esteban Lane Stubbs, 37, of Kremmling, Colo., pleaded guilty Thursday to one count of structuring a financial transaction, one of 21 counts in an indictment brought before Chief U.S. District Judge Ralph R. Beistline. In addition to the prison term, Stubbs will have to serve three years of supervised release and forfeit $336,753, according to information provided by Acting U.S. Attorney Kevin Feldis.

Stubbs owned Stubbs Enterprises, which did business under the name Lobo Drywall, court documents stated. He hired undocumented immigrants for drywall labor even though they were not legally permitted to work in the United States.

Stubbs paid these workers submarket wages in cash and failed to withhold and pay required employment taxes.

“These low wages and the absence of costs for income taxes, employment taxes, workers compensation, unemployment insurance and other benefits paid by legitimate employers allowed Stubbs to underbid fellow contractors and gain a significant share of the drywall business in the Anchorage Bowl and Matanuska-Susitna Valley,” the release stated.

Stubbs acknowledged concealing his illegal activities from the federal government by using large amounts of currency obtained in multiple withdrawals from different branches of First National Bank Alaska.

“Stubbs knew that a transaction involving more than $10,000 in currency would trigger the bank’s filing of a report to the [Internal Revenue Service], and he sought to evade the filing of that report,” the release stated.

Between November 2004 and January 2007, Stubbs “structured” withdrawals worth a total of $336,753 for the purpose of paying his employees in cash, thereby evading employment taxes he should have paid to the federal government.

The count to which Stubbs pleaded guilty involved the structuring of $19,500 in withdrawals from FNBA in November 2004.

According to information presented in court, Stubbs deposited a check for more than $35,000 into his account at FNBA on Nov. 15, 2004 and withdrew $5,000 in cash.

The next day, he visited five separate branches of FNBA, withdrawing between $1,500 and $5,000 in cash each time, for a total of $19,500 over a two-day period.

He completed similar transactions on a near-monthly basis for several years, totaling more than $500,000 in currency withdrawals between 2003 and 2007.

The IRS conducted the investigation.