The former president and general manager of the Cleveland Crunch, a professional soccer team that later became the Cleveland Force, has been charged with filing false income tax returns for the years 2003 through 2005.
View full sizePaul Garofolo, president and chief executive officer of Wolstein Sports & Entertainment Group LLC, left, listens to announcer and broadcaster Al Pawlowski before the start of a news conference for a proposed soccer complex Nov. 30, 2006, in Macedonia.Paul Garofolo, 51, of South Russell, who was employed by team owner North Coast Professional Sports Ltd. during the years in question, is accused of under-reporting his adjusted gross for those years by a combined $216,827.
At the same time he was running the Cleveland Force, Garofolo also was co-owner of a company called Signature Sports & Marketing Inc.
Federal prosecutors state Garofolo failed to report a portion of his North Coast salary, received in monthly installments of $8,333.33, that the owner of North Coast paid out of his own pocket.
Garofolo also took income received from North Coast and falsely reported it as self-employed income to assist with claiming business deductions, prosecutors said, while also falsely deducting health insurance premiums as Signature Sports expenses after having been reimbursed for the costs by North Coast.
Garofolo also used checks written on Signature Sports to pay Hawken School tuition for his children, then tried to write off the cost as a business expense.
Garofolo later led an effort to bring Major League Soccer to Northeast Ohio as president and CEO of Wolstein Sports & Entertainment Group LLC.