The founder of Yoga to the People — who was recently charged with tax evasion — has a history of using aliases and was close to both a mobster and a fugitive who fled the US for Mexico, prosecutors alleged at a court hearing Wednesday.
Greg Gumucio, who is facing federal tax evasion and conspiracy charges, has allegedly visited a mentor in Acapulco, Mexico, a number of times in recent years and even guest-taught yoga in the city, Assistant US Attorney Michael Neff said at the hearing in Manhattan federal court.
Neff — who argued for Gumucio to be placed on home incarceration pending trial — did not identify Gumucio’s on-the-run mentor but said the man fled after losing a civil suit in the US and is currently wanted by authorities.
The accused tax cheat has also previously used six aliases, three social security numbers and three birth dates, Neff alleged at the hearing — arguing he is a flight risk and should be ordered incarcerated pending trial.
Gumucio also has a history of “grooming” and threatening his former yoga employees – and palled around with a mobster, Neff told magistrate Judge Jennifer Willis.
“He was close to someone with a connection to organized crime,” the prosecutor said.
One yoga instructor Gumucio allegedly threatened was so frightened that she began to carry a gun with her after the encounter, according to the prosecutor.
Gumucio’s court-appointed attorney, Marne Lenox, argued her client’s appearance at the hearing Wednesday was evidence he could show up to his court dates and that he should be let go without home incarceration.
Lenox added that he hadn’t seen his fugitive mentor in years, and she believes he’s no longer even in Mexico.
“It’s not clear where this individual is,” she told the judge.
Judge Willis cut Gumucio loose on a $250,000 bond and limited his travel to the areas in New York, Oregon and Washington state, where he lives.
Gumucio, who founded Yoga to the People in 2006, was charged alongside his wife and another top executive last week for the tax evasion scheme.
From 2010 to 2020, Yoga to the People raked in some $20 million in revenue, but the company never filed a tax return with the IRS.
As part of the scheme, yoga teachers in the network collected payments in cash and sometimes held “stacking parties” to count the money.
Some of the parties were held at Gumucio’s East Village apartment, where workers would sometimes stash thousands of dollars in his guitar case.
Gumucio is due back in court Sept. 30.
https://nypost.com/2022/08/31/yoga-to-the-people-tax-cheat-is-friends-with-mobster-fugitive-feds/
