Press Release: 1/14/2026
AG’s Office Secures Guilty Plea from Chicopee Man for Tobacco Tax Evasion Scheme
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
1/13/2026
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Kennedy Sims, Deputy Press Secretary
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Call Kennedy Sims, Deputy Press Secretary at (617) 727-2543
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Email Kennedy Sims, Deputy Press Secretary at Kennedy.Sims@mass.gov
SPRINGFIELD — The Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office (AGO) today announced that Jaffar Syed, 52, of Chicopee, pled guilty in Hampden Superior Court to Tax Evasion (1 count) and Filing a False Tax Return (2 Counts) related to a scheme to evade excise taxes associated with the importation and sale of tobacco products. Syed was sentenced to 18 months in the House of Correction, suspended for three years, on the Tax Evasion charge, and three years probation on the False Tax Return charges.
The AGO indicted Syed in April 2024 after a joint investigation with the Massachusetts State Police (MSP) and the Department of Revenue’s Criminal Investigations Bureau revealed that Syed had purchased bulk amounts of smokeless tobacco, smoking tobacco, and cigars from a wholesale distributor in Pennsylvania and then sold those products through his company, Shaws Whole Sale LLC, to retailers primarily in and around Hampden County.
In addition to failing to pay the applicable excise taxes on the imported tobacco products, Shaws Whole Sale filed two tax returns in 2018 that falsely reported $0 tax liability. The investigation revealed that Syed evaded more than $100,000 in taxes from March 2018 through January 2019.
This matter was prosecuted by Assistant Attorney General Benjamin Woolf of the AGO’s White Collar and Public Integrity Division, with assistance from Senior Financial Investigator Eugene Griffin of the AGO’s Gaming Enforcement Division, the AGO’s Digital Evidence Lab, MSP, and the Department of Revenue’s Criminal Investigations Bureau.
The AGO’s White Collar and Public Integrity Division investigates and prosecutes serious criminal misconduct involving crimes against public agencies, corrupt public employees and public entities, crimes that have a harmful effect on public confidence in our government and other trust institutions, and financial crimes.