FROM STAFF REPORTS

A 40-year-old Pelham man is out on bond after a Shelby County grand jury indicted him recently on more than 40 counts of willful tax evasion and second-degree possession of a forged instrument.

Pelham resident Shamim Ahmed Khan surrendered at the Shelby County Jail on Jan. 19 after the grand jury indicted him on Jan. 11 on 27 counts of willful tax evasion and 15 counts of second-degree possession of a forged instrument.

Khan is the owner and president of Capital Wholesale Distribution, a cigar wholesale company located on Old Montgomery Highway in Pelham.

Khan has been accused of evading paying taxes each month from February 2008 through April 2010, and is also charged with 15 counts of presenting forged commercial invoices to the Alabama Department of Revenue.

Khan was released from the Shelby County Jail on bonds totaling $100,002 on Jan. 19.

If convicted of all counts, Khan faces a penalty of up to 285 years in prison and fines totaling $2.8 million, according to a press release from Alabama Revenue Commissioner Julie Magee.

Alabama Deputy Attorney General Mike Duffy of the attorney general’s Public Corruption and White Collar Crime Division and Jerome Dangerfield, a special agent with the Alabama Department of Revenue’s Investigations Division assisted in the case.