NH businessman accused of failing to pay $14.8 million in taxes
Jul. 2—The co-founder and former CEO of a home-based software business operating in New Hampshire and other states is prepared to admit later this month he knowingly failed to file tax returns for seven years and avoided paying $14.8 million in taxes, according to federal court documents.
Andrew Park operated CarNow, a software company that works with auto dealerships, out of homes he owned in Hanover and Bedford, court documents show.
Park is accused of deducting taxes from paychecks of CarNow employees and not forwarding the money to the Internal Revenue Service. He is accused of failing to pay both personal and business income taxes.
From about July 2016 through September 2021, Park used CarNow's bank account, which he controlled, to make regular transfers to his personal bank account as wages but did not report this income to the IRS or withhold federal income, Social Security and Medicare taxes, court documents show.
Also, from 2017 through 2020, Park transferred a yearly total of approximately $250,000 from CarNow's bank account at Bank of America to his personal bank account at JP Morgan Chase, in regular and recurring amounts, representing his wages for each such year.
"During the 2017 through 2020 tax years, he did not report this income to the IRS," according to court documents.
Paperwork filed with U.S. District Court in Concord shows Park and his attorneys — Lee Rubin and Glenn Kopp with Mayer Brown — have signed a plea agreement, with a plea hearing scheduled for July 22 before Chief Judge Landya B. McCafferty.
A request for comment Monday from Park or his attorneys went unanswered.
A spokesperson for CarNow confirmed Park was the co-founder and CEO of the company but has not been associated with the business "in any capacity" since his departure in April 2023.
"The company discovered the failure to remit payroll taxes in late 2021 and immediately took steps to correct the problem and to submit the withholdings on its own, before the government's investigation was even known," Lou Laste wrote in an email. "All of the monies owed have been remitted to the government and the employees are not at risk."
According to court documents, the payroll service used by CarNow sent Park "hundreds of notifications" between approximately January 2017 and August 2021, informing him CarNow "has payroll taxes due soon" to the IRS and state tax agencies.
"Despite knowing he had a legal duty to account for and pay over (CarNow's) employment taxes to the IRS, from 2014 through 2021 the defendant did not file corporate income tax returns or Forms 941" for CarNow, and "he deliberately avoided taking steps to determine whether the payroll taxes of (CarNow's) employees had actually been paid over to the IRS," court documents said.
While the vast majority of what Park is accused of not paying — $14,333,946 — involves payroll taxes, another $434,665 involves joint filings by Park and his wife, Eleanor Kyung, a former professor of business administration at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College.
Kyung has not been charged.
Park faces up to one year in prison on one count and up to five years on another, along with up to three years of supervised release, the agreement states.
In addition to paying what he owes, Park faces up to $350,000 in fines.
