5 Takeaways

• Plea Deal and Charges: Brothers Travis and Tripp Slaughter pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail, wire, and tax fraud just before Thanksgiving, defrauding the government and insurers of over $10 million.  
• Avoided Financial Obligations: By underreporting wages from 2017 to 2020, they dodged $2.7 million in payroll taxes and $2.8 million in workers’ compensation premiums.  
• Scheme: The brothers used professional employer organizations (PEOs) to issue official payroll checks based on false data, supplementing those payments with untaxed checks.  
• Restitution and Forfeiture: Travis will forfeit $2.7 million in fraud proceeds and pay $9.8 million in restitution, while Tripp will forfeit $416,800 and pay $1.17 million.  
• Potential Sentences: Each faces up to 20 years in prison for fraud and five years for tax crimes. Sentencing dates remain pending.  

Just a day before Thanksgiving, two brothers, owners of multiple roofing companies in the Jacksonville, Fla. area, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and conspiracy to commit tax fraud, defrauding the government and insurers out of more than $10 million. 

Federal prosecutors say the men, Travis Morgan Slaughter and Tripp Charles Slaughter, were charged in connection to a years-long scheme involving unpaid payroll taxes, falsified workers’ compensation insurance premiums, and underreported personal income.

Operating various names since 2007, including Great White Construction, Florida Roofing Experts, and 5 Star Roofing Services, the Justice Department said the siblings contracted with professional employer organizations to issue payroll checks, file payroll tax returns, and pay workers’ compensation premiums. However, the DOJ said the Slaughters intentionally underreported employee wages to avoid payroll taxes and insurance costs.

In a detailed news release on Nov. 27, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida said that from 2017 to 2020, the company issued $18.5 million in direct payments to employees, avoiding $2.7 million in payroll taxes. The Slaughters also underreported wages, resulting in $2.8 million in unpaid premiums. Their personal tax issues included Travis Slaughter not paying $2.4 million in income taxes from 2014 to 2019 and Tripp Slaughter evading $263,614 during the same period.

“[T]he defendants avoided the payment of millions of dollars in additional payroll taxes to the IRS … [and] millions of dollars in premiums to workers’ compensation insurers,” prosecutors argued.

Officials laid out the brothers’ scheme of splitting checks. Professional employer organizations cut checks to employees based on underreported hours worked and deduct taxes accordingly. The brothers then supplemented those checks with second checks from company-owned bank accounts to make employees whole without deducting federal taxes.

According to reporting by The Florida Times-Union, Travis Slaughter was facing jail time for more than a year unless he paid the federal government $2.2 million in fines days before a grand jury handed down the second indictment naming both brothers in the larger scheme.

Travis Slaughter, 51, faced a much longer list of charges — 18 counts, compared to six for younger brother Tripp, 48, whose charges included four counts of filing false tax returns.

The indictment followed a years-long court fight between Travis Slaughter and the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which in 2020 convinced an appeals court to hold Travis in contempt for not paying $2.2 million in fines from a series of inspections.

The DOJ says Travis Slaughter has agreed to forfeit $2.7 million in fraud proceeds and pay restitution of more than $9.8 million, covering payroll tax losses, unpaid insurance premiums, and workers’ compensation claims. Tripp Slaughter has agreed to forfeit $416,800 and pay $1.17 million in restitution. 

The government invested significant resources in the case. United States Attorney Roger B. Handberg, who first brought charges against the brothers last February, hailed the case as a testament to rigorous investigative work.

“This scheme undermined the integrity of our tax and insurance systems, harming workers and taxpayers alike,” he stated. The case involved efforts from the IRS Criminal Investigation Division, Homeland Security Investigations, and the Florida Department of Financial Services.

The brothers each face up to 20 years in prison for mail and wire fraud and up to five years for tax fraud. According to the Justice Department, no sentencing date has been set.