WPB teen's tax return filed in Belle Glade

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Karrie Dubois, 18, is out on summer vacation from Florida State University, but instead of enjoying the summer, she's been creating a file.

In the file is a lot of paperwork regarding the tax return someone else has filed using her identity.

"I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy," Dubois said. "It's a lot of stress."

The FSU student says she hasn't tax return check in years. When she didn't get her refund check this year she started to worry, since she was expecting a check.

"I looked at my credit report and I saw the weird Belle Glade address," Dubois said.

The IRS tells Dubois that someone else was filing her tax return in her name from an address more than 30 miles away from her West Palm Beach home.

Dubois said she's never even stopped in Belle Glade. She's only driven through it.

NewsChannel 5 decided to stop by the address receiving Karrie's IRS refunds and nobody was home at first.

After the story aired at 5 p.m., Charles Shepherd, a City of Belle Glade maintenance worker who has worked for the city for 7 years, came home.

He was covered in paint, sweaty and hands look like he'd been doing hard labor all day. When asked if he knew Karrie Dubois, he said he didn't.

When asked if he ever received a tax refund check, he responded that he didn't.

Shepherd said he feels bad for the teenager and now wonders if someone is using his house as a front to receive tax refund checks.

The IRS won't say if Shepherd's home is the home an IRS watchdog report said 741 tax returns were allegedly fraudulently filed from in one year.

"Why can't they know about this and why can't they act upon it," Dubois said. "It baffles me how the government just can't do that."

Shepherd who moved to Belle Glade from Barbados in 1979 said he had his social security card, green card along with his wallet stolen a little more than a year ago.

He said he works really hard for his money and has been receiving his check in the mail, but nobody else's.

It angers him someone else may be profiting off of his address.

Dubois, who is studying to be a tax lawyer, thinks e-filing is the problem.

"E-Filing is so easy now-a-days. You don't even do it yourself," she said. "You type your name, you hit send. How do they know it's really you?"

The dreaded experience the teenager has gone through has caused her to be extra cautious and she thinks everyone else should be too.

"It's a lot of work, but it's definitely less work than having to go through this," Dubois said.