The host of the pubTV show Saddle Up with Dennis Brouse on Thursday (May 31) was sentenced to 10 years in prison by a District Court judge in Iowa in connection with a state filmmaking tax-incentive program scandal that was uncovered in 2009, reports the Des Moines Register. Brouse had been convicted of fraudulent practices in March.
The horse trainer “told a state investigator he had never declared bankruptcy, never gambled nor had his wages garnished — all deceptions that backfired at his sentencing for fraud,” the newspaper noted.
Brouse’s Changing Horses Productions had been awarded $9.27 million in tax credits for five projects, but a state audit last year reportedly found discrepancies including $2.18 million in expenditures claimed by Changing Horses paid to companies outside Iowa, which wasn’t allowed, and $1 million in expenses not supported by documentation. The tax incentives were suspended in September 2009 after state officials discovered several filmmakers were exploiting the program’s rules to qualify for millions of dollars in tax credits.