Healthcare Businessman Prescribes Himself a Yacht and Maserati

Richard Rief, a St. Louis businessman, was indicted on 14 counts of failure to collect and pay over employment taxes and two counts of failure to file or pay tax.

Rief owned and operated Med Plus Staffing, a healthcare staffing business, and Rief Healthcare, a hospice care company. He reported employment taxes due to the IRS, but failed to pay them, except when necessary to convince the IRS to let him set up an installment agreement. Once the agreement was in place he never made another payment. In total, Rief failed to pay over $522,000 in employment taxes he collected from his employees’ paychecks.

In 2015 and 2016, Rief also failed to pay individual taxes due of approximately $107,332. During this time he led a lavish lifestyle and spent money on luxury items including a 50 foot yacht, a Maserati and a hangar for his private plane.

In addition to restitution to the IRS, Rief faces five years in prison for failing to pay over the employment taxes and one year in prison for failure to file each tax return.