The Jersey Shore’s, Mike Sorrentino was sentenced today to 8 months in federal prison and two years of supervised release fter pleading guilty in January to failure to pay taxes on $8.9 million of income earned between 2010 and 2012. Mike has already paid $123,913 in restitution. His brother Marc also plead guilty to tax evasion.
Marc Sorrentino was just sentenced to has just been sentenced to 2 years and a $75k fine. Mike has always blamed his brother for “the situation” and his sentence was expected to be longer.
Waiting…
The entire cast of Jersey Shore showed up dressed entirely in black, silent and solemn,to support their fellow cast member.The cast was followed by Jersey Show cameras filming their arrival. Snooki has been all over the media the past week saying the cast has spent a lot of time with Mike in his final week keeping him distracted.On the most recent of Jersey Shore the cast has repeatedly expressed concerns for Mike saying they honestly don’t think he can handle prison. Mike arrived to court separately with his fiancee, Lauren Pesce.
The sentencing hearing was supposed to start at 11:30 this morning but it seems to have been delayed a bit by all the people trying to get through security to observe the proceedings. It’s 12:30 and I’ve got nothing coming out of the courtroom yet. It looks like they may have a no texting rule happening or his case is not up yet.
While I am refreshing for more information, I will catch you up on other Jersey Shore news you may have missed. J Wow is divorcing her husband. If I had to guess, he is sick and tires of her filming Jersey Shore. They are filming now and have filmed three seasons of Jersey Shore Vacation, nearly back to back to back leaving him at home with their two kids, four year old Meilani and their two year old son Greyson. Greyson has significant speech delays and is in therapy three times a week. This is a lot to leave on a husband while you party in Miami and Vegas. I realize that the huge paycheck will ultimately help with all of the unexpected expenses, I am just saying that I can understand her husband being frustrated and overwhelmed.
Ronnie, who I believe lives in Las Vegas (Where Paulie D lives) has hired an attorney to fight for custody of his young daughter. There have been numerous arrests between the child’s parents as both have apparently assaulted the other. The mother seems particularly unstable. If she seems worse than Ronnie as a parent that is kind of scary. Oddly, TMZ has a photo of these two out with the baby seeming totally back together.
What on earth has taken so long? Did they decide to break for lunch or something? Here come the sentences! Apparently, if you left court to report on Marc, you couldn’t get back in for Mike’s sentencing. This is taking forever.
Mike couldn’t handle prison? Mike couldn’t handle the life of Riley. This might be the best thing for him and I hate seeing nonviolent offenders go to prison no matter how distasteful I find them (I’m holding my tongue).
I hate that JWow is getting divorced. They always seemed to be a solid couple.
I hate it, too. Their kids are so young and they did seem like a solid couple who has been going through some stressful times. Hopefully they can work through it and make it work.
Roger probably shouldn’t have cheated on her, that would have helped his marriage
Ah! Is THAT what happened?
J Woww’s husband took to social media to say that he wants things to work out for them and they will go to counseling to “break their bad patterns that they continue to fall into.”
So perhaps there is hope. I don’t understand a mother (or a father) breaking up a family with two very small children.
She is the one that filed.
That seems a little harsh. He has made such leaps and bounds as a person, I was hoping he would be put on home detention or very long probation. But, you can’t fuck with the taxman.
unless you’re the president, apparently lol
So he earned over 8 million in two years and could not bother to pay his taxes. Sorry, I don’t feel his pain.
Karen, you hit it on the nose! That’s the kind of money that we mere mortals can only dream about, especially someone whose only claim to fame was being on Jersey Shores. The first thing he should have done was to hire an accountant to take care of all the legal details – he had to have known taxes weren’t being paid. He’s been living the high life (and messing himself up) for a long time on money that should have gone to pay his taxes, so maybe a few months in prison will get him to straighten up his act. He’s 36 years old – time to grow up and face his responsibilities, like the rest of us do. Still, going to prison sounds really frightening, so I hope he’ll do OK – I can’t imagine they’d put him in with the general population, so I’m sure there’s some kind of special area for celebrities or other people who need to be kept safe.
Mike will not be in any sort of special area. He will be in prison just like all the other reality show participants.
Mike and his brother Marc set up companies to capitalize on Mike’s success. The untaxed income was not just from his salaries. He was charging five figures for appearances at the height of Jersey Shore fame. Marc set up companies to make T-shirts that sold very well because of the T-SHIRT TIME! rituals on the show. I believe there were books and comic books. All of this revenue was managed by Marc who has a degree from NYU and was viewed as “the smart brother.”
However, Mike was not unaware of the shady behavior. He even participated in hiding revenue by making smaller donations under $10K that are not reported to the US Treasury. He deliberately attempted to avoid paying taxes with full knowledge of what he was doing. Additionally the two wrote off expensive clothes and cars as business expenses. I think the clothes were probably fine but the cars not so much.
Their other brother, Frank, or Maximo as he calls himself has his own legal situation. He claims his father who shares his name has been using his social security number for years to gain employment, housing and medical insurance. The thing is no one seems to know where Frank Sr. is anymore. Mike’s success seems to have destroyed this entire family.
It”s not that he couldn’t be bothered to pay his taxes. Merely owing the IRS is not a crime. There has to be an element of fraud for it to be criminal. Things like hiding income and filing falsified returns are what get you in trouble.
I guess my point is that his “situation” is not one that “regular people” will find themselves in, or that he just made a lazy or innocent mistake.
He intentionally defrauded the US Government, and by extension, of of us taxpayers.
Whether he hired an accountant or not doesn’t make any difference. He set out to cheat and got caught. I can’t believe he ever thought he wouldn’t.
He was first charged with tax evasion in 2014!!! He has been out free all this time. He got delay after delay. If it we’re us ordinary folks, do you honestly believe we would be out free almost 5 years?? No way. You messed with the IRS Mike. No your situation is prison. About time.
I agree with you one hundred percent, Margaret. I think that the difference with Mike’s situation and the other reality show participants currently and formerly incarcerated is that Mike has cleaned up his act, taken accountability for his prior bad acts and been living and straight and narrow life for the past three years or so. Many people think he has “learned his lesson” and I agree.
I also thinks he needs to do a reasonable amount of time like everyone else. He will probably be out in six months.
Isn’t it insane that “the situation” is going to do more time for a bit of tax fraud than some rapists do? I think of brock turner, serving 3 goddamn months for attacking that poor woman, every time a nonviolent offender gets a sentence many times longer than his. infuriates me. our system is backwards.
Just because someone like that entitled kid was able to buy a verdict, doesn’t mean that Mike got a bum deal. In fact, I think he got off easy with eight months. If there weren’t harsh penalties for not paying your taxes, more people would attempt to evade the system.
Oh I’m not saying there shouldn’t be harsh penalties for tax evasion, it’s just striking to me when those penalties seem harsher than those for violent offenses. Assholes who assault women and get slaps on the wrist. We all know brock turner isn’t the only one who got off easy, unfortunately 🙁
I’m glad Mike didn’t get a harsher sentence. He has really turned it around over the last few years, and I am proud of him. It’s hard to learn to live a sober life, period, and it’s a lot harder when you’ve had so much money and adulation. I hope he can stay on the path.
what is the process to determine which prison a person will be sent to? for example, teresa was sentenced in nj court but served time in danbury, ct – is it based on the type of crime committed?
Defense can request that the judge suggest a particular prison, but it is up to the Bureau of Prisons to make a final determination (in my experience, if a judge makes a recommendation it is typically followed).
He will go to a low security prison/prison camp. People often ask to go to one near their home so family can easily visit. There are fewer women’s prisons, so that is why Theresa went to CT.
There are two low security prisons in NJ, one at Ft Dix. If his fiance/family live elsewhere, they may request a different prison.
Criminal charges filed by the IRS are Federal Charges so he will go to a low security federal prison. As thill said. Most likely fort dix. Maybe he can have Joe Giudice’s old room. Maybe he can bunk with Apollo Nida who is still at Fort Dix. He will be there for two more years.
Retired tax lawyer here. He is not going to go through anything bad on normal people’s terms.
WTF does that even mean? I’m pretty sure normal people think going to prison is a bad thing.
And has he paid the government the taxes he should have paid as well as any penalties? $123,000 and A $75,000 fine don’t touch what would be owed on $8 million income.
They paid taxes. They just didn’t claim all of their revenue and made large deductions that were not legal. The $123K is the difference in what they paid and what they should have paid.
Lots of ways to do it legally. Likely a bad lawyer and accountant.
I think even 8 months is a little much, but I’m glad it wasn’t longer. Mike has really turned his life around and I’m happy to see it.
Actually, according to Jenni’s husband, he is working very hard to win her back, so I think your read on the reasons for their split are off.