Bouvrie speaks out about his tax fraud arrest

Thursday 11 March 2010

Society interior designer Jan des Bouvrie told a news conference on Thursday afternoon his arrest on tax fraud charges centres on the value added tax levied over an €80,000 bill which was addressed to the wrong company due to a typing error.

The recipients of the bill wrongly deducted the value added tax as a business expense, but the bill related to work on a private house, Des Bouvrie said.

The designer and tv presenter, who is 67, said he had been arrested at his home in Naarden at 7am on Tuesday morning by heavily-armed agents from the tax evasion investigation department FIOD. He was released on Wednesday evening.

'I have been questioned about this bill for two days and three hours,' he told reporters.

According to the Telegraaf, the designer submitted bills for hundreds of thousands of euros worth of work to the Kroon Group in Zeist. But in fact, the work was carried out on owner Evert Kroon's private home in France and his €6.5m yacht, the paper says.

The trick allowed Kroon to deduct value added tax on the work on his private home and reduce his property group's corporate tax liabilities. In total, the fraud has cost the taxpayer €1.5m, the paper says.

Kroon and another staffer from the Kroon Group are still in custody.

© DutchNews.nl

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