Former Ill. rep indicted on income tax charges
Former Rep. Mel Reynolds (D-Ill.) was indicted Friday on charges that he didn’t file federal income tax returns for four straight years.
The grand jury indictment states that Reynolds, who served in Congress from 1993 to 1995, failed to file returns from 2009 to 2012, the Associated Press reported.
While no arraignment date has been set, each of the four counts carries a maximum sentence of one year in prison and $250,000 fine on conviction.
{mosads}The 63-year-old former lawmaker and Rhodes Scholar was previously convicted by a state court in 1995 on sexual assault and sexual abuse charges involving an underage campaign volunteer who worked on his 1992 run.
Reynolds was sentenced to five years in prison and forced to resign from Congress. While in prison, he was convicted of, among other things, bank fraud and making false statement to the Federal Election Commission.
President Clinton eventually commuted his sentence.
In 2012, Reynolds launched an unsuccessful bid for to return to Congress, after former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) resigned from his post after pleading guilty to misusing $750,000 in campaign funds.
Last year, Reynolds was arrested and jailed in Zimbabwe on charges he had sexually explicit photos and videos on his mobile phone in violation of a censorship law, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Authorities dropped the pornography charges and Reynolds pleaded guilty to a lesser visa violation. He was deported back to the U.S.
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