“The members of the band are musicians and not experts in bookkeeping or international trade — let alone delivering tax returns and related data,” the band’s legal representative Bjarnfredur Olafsson told PEOPLE in a statement. “That is why they hired internationally recognized experts to take care of the books and all necessary reports to the Icelandic authorities. But it has come to light that wrong returns were delivered to the internal revenue and/or they were delivered too late. At the same time, the members of the band thought these matters were in order and in the hand of professionals.”
The statement continued, “It will now be up to the district prosecutor to prove that the individual members of the band were grossly negligent in filing their tax returns. In light of the facts of the case, I cannot see how that can be done and therefore it is disappointing that the district prosecutor has decided to indict them.”
Disappointing is an understatement.
