Updated 1/20/20

The owner of Farmers Family Restaurant admits that he committed tax evasion.

Billy Raynor, 66, the principal officer of Farmers Family Restaurant in Columbia, submitted a guilty plea accepting responsibility for six counts of hindering revenue collections and one count of tax evasion in County Circuit Court last week.

Judge J. Russell Parkes accepted Raynor’s plea and sentenced him to two years of supervised probation.

If he keeps a clean record for two years, Raynor can have his record expunged.

The case was investigated by Special Agent Barry Cayce and Attorney Will Binkley who worked in cooperation with the Tennessee Department of Revenue.

Farmers Family Restaurant, a buffet-style eatery, moved to its current location at the Columbia Mall in the summer of 2015.