Former Latitude 360 CEO Brent Brown pleads guilty to one count of federal payroll tax fraud

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The embattled former CEO of entertainment company Latitude 360 pleaded guilty on Thursday to one count of payroll tax fraud, according to a federal plea agreement.

Action News Jax told you in January 2022 that Brent Brown was originally facing 17 counts of failing to remit to the IRS payroll taxes withheld from employees of four businesses that he operated under the umbrella of Latitude 360. Originally, Brown pleaded not guilty to all 17 counts.

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According to the original indictment, Brown operated four subsidiaries – Latitude 360 Jacksonville LLC, Latitude 360 Indianapolis LLC, Latitude 360 Pittsburgh LLC, and Latitude 360 Albany LLC, over which he exercised exclusive authority to determine the use of business funds.

“Those subsidiaries each withheld taxes from employee wages, including federal income taxes and Federal Insurance Contributions Act (”FICA”) taxes, which the subsidiaries were required to remit to the Internal Revenue Service periodically. Brown filed quarterly tax returns for each of the subsidiaries accurately reflecting the payroll taxes due for each of the subsidiaries but he caused those subsidiaries to fail to remit to the IRS the full amounts due,” according to a news release from when Brown was originally indicted.

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On Thursday, Brown pleaded guilty to count 13, which included “taxes withheld and not paid over by L360 Jacksonville in the fourth quarter of 2015.” The amount of those taxes was $146,819.

Action News Jax has been following developments in the case against Brown since January 2016, when Latitude 360′s Jacksonville location abruptly closed its doors.

In May 2016, former Action News Jax reporter Jenna Bourne confronted Brown over accusations that he owed millions of dollars to employees, contractors, landlords and lenders. “This is not appropriate,” Brown said, as Bourne started asking questions.

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The maximum penalties Brown faces include five years in prison, a fine of $250,000, and a term of supervised release of three years.

Brown will also have to pay restitution of $3,832,360.48, a calculation of unpaid taxes from all four Latitude 360 locations. According to the plea agreement, Brown “expects to argue for a lesser tax loss at his sentencing hearing.”

A sentencing date has not been set yet.

READ THE FULL PLEA AGREEMENT BELOW:

RELATED COVERAGE:

[ Latitude 360 closes its doors on the Southside ]

[ Report: Latitude 360 didn’t report wages ]

[ State Attorney’s Office investigating Latitude 360 ]

[ Latitude 360 CEO Brent Brown in BuzzFeed report: ‘I don’t owe anybody s---’ ]

[ Main Entertainment Event opens in Jacksonville at former Latitude 360 ]

[ Jacksonville mansion where Latitude 360 CEO lived cited for illegal events ]

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