Attorney files for more time to charge mastermind

Authorities are required to charge suspects formally within 30 days of their arrest. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy G. Lynch filed a request Friday asking for an additional 90 days to consider Harriette Walters' case because "the intensive, ongoing" investigation requires the review of "extraordinarily large volumes of governmental and financial records covering a significantly long period of time."

Walters and six others are accused of bilking the public out of at least $20 million through a series of phony property tax refunds over nearly a decade.

In what may be the first public acknowledgement that the investigation has widened its focus beyond 1999 -- the earliest years for which computerized tax office records are available -- Lynch said in his extension request that he expects "the volume of records will only continue to increase as the investigation proceeds, particularly since financial records generally take more time to obtain the farther back in time they were created."

Friday's filing also drops broad hints that Walters may have been helped by others in the tax office. So far, only former tax office employee Diane Gustus has been formally charged in the scheme, but Lynch said that Walters was "aided and abetted by others" and relied on "significant efforts and financial transactions to conceal proceeds of the scheme and further and promote the scheme itself."

"The proceeds have been distributed locally, nationally, and internationally," Lynch wrote.

Walters' lawyer, former prosecutor Steven C. Tabackman, has already agreed to one extension and said in open court that he was hoping to talk with prosecutors about his case. Tabackman did not respond to requests for comment Friday.

Got a tip on the tax scandal? Call Bill Myers at 202-459-4956 or send him an e-mail, bmyers@dcexaminer.com.