Co-Owner of Bare Feet Shoes Sentenced in Tax Scheme

A co-owner of the Bare Feet Shoes retail chain has been sentenced in Philadelphia to 30 months in federal prison for paying workers off the books to avoid nearly $600,000 in federal taxes.
 
A judge on Thursday ordered 42-year-old Uri Jacobson to also pay more than $1.2 million in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service.
 
Federal prosecutors say Jacobson and store manager Elena Falaschetti failed to report almost $2.8 million in wages paid to employees from 2003 to 2009.
 
Authorities say Jacobson had Falaschetti and others falsify payroll reports. They also say both of them underreported their own income for years.
 
Falaschetti was sentenced in May to six months of home confinement.
 
Wyncote-based Bare Feet Shoes employs 200 people in 12 stores in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.