Grammy-nominated Latin music superstar Romeo Santos is suing his accounting and business management firm, alleging more than $2 million in losses due to professional malpractice and gross negligence.
In a lawsuit filed in Miami federal court, Santos claims Morrison Brown Argiz & Farra LLP, now known as BDO, failed to file his complex, multi-state tax returns correctly and allowed a large cash balance to sit idle in his checking account “earning nothing.” He alleges the firm erroneously reported him as a full-year non-resident of New York on his 2021 tax return, triggering an audit, and that the return was “not merely aggressive; it was incoherent.”
According to the complaint, BDO omitted required New York income while simultaneously apportioning a quarter of his W-2 income to the state “a figure supported by no work papers and no analysis.” Santos also claims the firm purchased a duplicate workers’ compensation insurance policy and kept him on an expensive private health insurance policy despite his eligibility for superior SAG-AFTRA coverage at a lower cost.
Additional allegations include the firm’s failure to fund his IRA and unauthorized debits from a Santos account following the firm’s termination. Santos is demanding a jury trial and seeking damages including tax penalties, interest, professional fees to remediate errors, and lost value associated with mismanaged accounts, in an amount no less than $2.3 million.
The 45-year-old Bronx-born singer was nominated for Best Tropical Album for his 2011 solo debut, Formula, Vol. 1, and won Best Merengue/Bachata Album for Fórmula, Vol. 3 at the 2023 Latin Grammys. BDO did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Source: Rolling Stone Music
