A former partner at accounting firm BDO Seidman was sentenced to three months in prison Tuesday after pleading guilty to participating in a huge tax-shelter scheme that defrauded the U.S. government of $1.5 billion.
Robert Greisman was the third ex-BDO partner sentenced by U.S. District Judge William Pauley in Manhattan this week for a tax-shelter conspiracy involving BDO and the law firm Jenkens & Gilchrist, Reuters reported.
Prosecutors said Greisman, who worked in BDO’s Chicago office from 1998 to 2004, designed, marketed and implemented fraudulent tax shelters with Jenkens & Gilchrist.
The government said he was the primary contact at BDO for two Jenkens partners, Paul Daugerdas and Donna Guerin, as well as David Parse, a Deutsche Bank broker at the time who prosecutors said participated in the scheme.
BDO USA, the accounting firm’s new name, agreed in June 2012 to pay $50 million to resolve related government claims through a deferred prosecution agreement.
Greisman sought probation after agreeing to cooperate with authorities, as did his colleagues, Charles Bee and Adrian Dicker, two former BDO vice chairmen.
But Judge Pauley imposed jail sentences on the men. He called their fraud “breathtaking” since it caused the United States to lose $1.5 billion in tax revenue. He jailed for 15 months and gave Dicker 10 months in prison.
Greisman’s jail term will be followed by three years of probation, including six months of home confinement. He was also ordered, along with the other defendants, to pay more than $69 million in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service.
As for the Jenkens partners, Parse was sentenced in 2013 to 42 months in prison.
Daugerdas, Guerin and Field won a retrial.
Guerin pleaded guilty to conspiracy and tax evasion charges ahead of the second trial and was sentenced to eight years in prison.
At the retrial, a jury acquitted Field in October and convicted Daugerdas on seven of the 16 counts he faced, including conspiracy, tax evasion and mail fraud.
Daugerdas is scheduled to be sentenced on June 25.
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Julie DiMauro is the executive editor of FCPA Blog and can be reached here.
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