iscoverThe ex-wife of a Sydney underworld figure has failed to overturn a $1,442,534 tax bill following an amended income tax assessment from the ATO.
Former mob wife fails to overturn $1,442,534 tax bill
06 October 2025
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9 minute read
In November 2022, the ATO chased down Latifah Ahmad, the ex-wife of Sydney underworld figure Ahmad Ahmad, for millions of dollars in unpaid income tax as part of a broader NSW Police inquiry into the ‘Ahmad Group’ organised crime family.
Late last month (26 September), the Administrative Review Tribunal declined to overturn Latifah Ahmad’s $1,442,534 tax bill, which resulted from penalties and amended income tax assessments from 30 June 2013 and 30 June 2016.
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She declared a taxable income of $83,891 over the four-year period, stemming from the small luxury handbag business she ran from home, while being the primary carer for her children.
However, an audit revealed that she had acquired numerous assets, which were incongruous with this level of income, including an unencumbered residential property worth $1.3 million and a new car.
After conducting an ‘asset betterment calculation,’ the Commissioner of Taxation estimated that her true taxable income had been closer to $1,651,795.
It ordered that the amended assessment and penalty assessments should be raised due to the resultant tax shortfall, culminating in a tax liability of over $1,442,534.
In her appeal case, Latifah Ahmad said that her taxable income had been consistent with the returns she had lodged, and any unexplained deposits in her accounts had been made by her former husband, who “engaged in both organised crime and legitimate business” and also controlled her access to her accounts.
Latifah Ahmad told the courts that in 2012, when she decided to turn her hobby of sourcing discounted designer handbags for friends and family into a small business, her husband had handled the set-up of the business and its bank accounts.
He had given her permission to start her business, a requirement under sharia law, and took her to see his accountant for the purposes of setting up her company, which was to be known as Lamaaj Investments.
However, Latifah Ahmad told the courts that her husband told her to wait in the waiting room, while the business discussions occurred, and she was told to sign documents pertaining to the business, which were never explained to her.
The couple then went to Westpac Bankstown, where she was told to open an account for Lamaaj under the instructions of Ahmad Ahmad’s accountant, Steve Vlahos.
From then on, Latifah Ahmad said that her husband hadn’t allowed her to access the Lamaaj account without his permission. He allegedly “began depositing money into the account and withdrawing funds from it that were unrelated to the business for which Laamaj had been incorporated,” she said.
She claimed that Ahmad Ahmad had used the Lamaaj account for transactions that had “no relation” to her small enterprise and said that these deposits should have been disregarded in the appraisal of her taxable income.
However, the courts did not accept Latifah Ahmad’s arguments to overturn the penalties, finding that she had not kept sufficient records for her business and acted with “recklessness” with regard to tax law.
“While I accept that Mr Ahmad then also transacted on that account to a significant degree it does not change the fact that Mrs Ahmad engaged in that activity using a corporate entity while creating or retaining virtually no records of her transactions other than the odd receipt,” court documents read.
“A reasonable person in equivalent circumstances must be expected to have known that the operation of a company carrying on such trade would require the creation and retention of at least basic transactional records to establish how much income may have been derived by it.”
It added that the Lamaaj funds had been used to pay for private expenses, including airline tickets in hotels, which a “reasonable person” would determine to be assessable income.
“This failure to keep the most basic level of records or appreciate that money drawn from those accounts and used for personal purposes might be taxable shows a gross indifference to the “operation of a taxation law” in a manner that I would describe as reckless,” court documents read.
“It follows that the Applicant has not discharged her burden to show that the Penalty Assessments were excessive.”
The case is Ahmad and Commissioner of Taxation (Taxation) [2025] ARTA 1907 (26 September 2025).
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