By Matthew K. Roy
Staff writer
July 03, 2009 05:45 am BEVERLY — A Beverly man who stole millions of dollars worth of excise taxes from the city of Boston will spend the next 18 months in jail. Stephen Colahan, 53, pleaded guilty yesterday in Suffolk Superior Court to charges of larceny over $250 by continuous scheme and procurement fraud, He was also ordered to pay $1.9 million in restitution to the city. Colahan's company, Walker Associates, was under contract with the city from 1995 until June 2007 to collect delinquent motor vehicle excise taxes from Boston residents. Beginning in June 2001, Colahan began taking money out of the bank account where the company deposited the city's tax and fee collections and using it to cover Walker's business expenses. He repeatedly stole from the account over the next five years, transferring more than $2.7 million into his company's account, the attorney general office's investigation found. Colahan periodically made repayments, totaling $800,000, to the city account. Late in 2006, the city demanded that Walker Associates submit a complete copy of its computer data related to excise tax collections. The company, at Colahan's direction, produced misleading data that omitted taxpayer payments that had actually been made but never been reported or turned over to the city, according to a press release from the Attorney General Martha Coakley's office. The company, following Colahan's instructions, also gave falsified information to the city's new vendor in 2007. Superior Court Judge Carol Ball sentenced Colahan to 21âÑ2 years in jail with 18 months to serve. The balance of the sentence will be suspended for a 10-year probationary period. The attorney general's office began its inquiry in October 2007 after being alerted by Boston Police and the city. State police assigned to the attorney general's office and officers from the Boston Police Anti-Corruption Unit assisted with the investigation.
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