Register Gaurd – by Jack Moran
A Coquille pastor and his wife may be on the run from federal authorities who want to see them imprisoned in a $1.2 million tax evasion case.
Two federal judges today issued arrest warrants for Ronald and Dorothea Joling after they failed to show up for scheduled court appearances in Eugene.
Attorneys for the couple told Chief U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken that they had no information regarding the Jolings’ whereabouts. Aiken had been scheduled to make sentencing decisions in the couple’s case. Instead, she issued warrants for their arrests.
“To be perfectly honest, this is really surprising,” Aiken said after learning that the Jolings had not come to court this morning.
Prosecutors had been set to ask Aiken to sentence Ronald Joling, 71, to more than 10 years in prison, and recommend a 5-year prison sentence for his wife.
“It is time (the Jolings) learned that they are not above the law and that they have a duty and a responsibility to pay their fair share of taxes,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Bradford wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed this week.
The government, which has initiated foreclosure proceedings against the couple, wants Aiken to order the Jolings to repay the $1.2 million owed in back taxes and associated penalties.
A federal jury in Eugene convicted the Jolings of conspiracy to defraud the government after a trial in October. Ronald Joling was also found guilty of tax evasion and two counts of filing false tax returns. The jury acquitted Dorothea Joling, 72, of a tax evasion charge.
Ronald Joling, who has served for decades as pastor of a conservative Christian church in Coquille, testified during the trial that he stopped paying income taxes in the early 1990s after years of self-guided study led him to conclude that the nation’s tax laws do not apply to him. He and his wife at one point tried to revoke their U.S. citizenship, and have been associated with “sovereign citizen” and tax protester movements.
Dorothea Joling’s trial defense, meanwhile, was that she had no say in her husband’s decision to stop paying taxes. Her lawyer, Emilio Bandiero, told the jury in an opening statement that his client is an “obedient wife” whose God “speaks to her through her husband.”
Authorities say the couple — who have been married more than 50 years and own multiple pieces of property in Coos and Linn counties — tried a number of schemes to hide their assets from the government, including setting up trusts into which they transferred property titles; opening and using bank accounts in those trusts’ names; filing a bankruptcy petition to stop collection efforts; and depositing more than $110,000 into a “warehouse bank” in an attempt to conceal their ownership of the money.
The Jolings’ legal troubles don’t end with the tax evasion case. They were scheduled to be arraigned this afternoon on charges that accuse them of filing false, retaliatory liens against a number of federal officials, including Aiken, Bradford and U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Coffin.
After calling the Jolings’ cases and finding them absent — in court proceedings that took place two hours after the called-off sentencing hearing — Coffin issued a second set of arrest warrants for the couple.
According to court documents, the Jolings claim in paperwork filed with the Internal Revenue Service that the officials named in the phony liens owe them more than $100 million.
“These filings clearly demonstrate (the Jolings’) lack of remorse, their continued rejection of this court’s authority and their dangerousness,” Bradford wrote in the sentencing memorandum.
Follow Jack on Twitter @JackMoranRG . Email jack.moran@registerguard.com .
Tax evasion? What tax, by whom, by what authority?
Anyone who wanted to help the minors should help this couple of american nationals.
10 years to a 70yo and 100million zollar$…
Run for it.
Next time keep less paper work and bury the bodies quietly.
“they are not above the law and have a duty and a responsibility to pay their fair share of taxes.” Well, let’s get out that “fair share meter” and apply it to BOA, Citicorp, J.P. Morgan, Wells-Fargo, General Dynamics, Halliburton, Northrup-Grummond, Amoco, Exxon-Mobile, and all the other tax cheating son’s of bitches who just got another break by Capitol Hill with repeal of the Estate Tax. They’re robbing us blind people and, as Bill Hicks said, “Nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care.” We will all eventually walk off the edge of the abyss if things don’t take on a drastic change. I’m willing to stand against this tyranny because I will never accept it as “the norm”. These greedy son’s of bitches will be reckoned with at some point. I’ll be somewhere at that time makin’ things right.
“The dude abides”
For sure Millard
I almost vomited when I read that fair share BS. The word the us attorn-ey used too.
“These filings clearly demonstrate (the Jolings’) lack of remorse, their continued rejection of this court’s authority and their dangerousness,” Bradford wrote in the sentencing memorandum.
dangerousNESS. bah hahahahahahahha dangerousness. Yup that 70yo couple have MUCH DANGEROUSNESS. [pulls trigger with toe]
Domestic terrorists for sure Ryan. And they will be made an example of to keep the “sheeples” “quivering in their boots”.
““It is time (the Jolings) learned that they are not above the law and that they have a duty and a responsibility to pay their fair share of taxes,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Bradford wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed this week.”
Spoken like a true government hypocrite. The bastard ought to take a look in the mirror. By the way, what law? Also, I’m guessing the pastor wasn’t a 501c3 minister.