A California attorney has been sentenced to serve 10 months in prison for helping clients hide away millions in secret Swiss bank accounts.

A California attorney has been sentenced to serve 10 months in prison for helping clients hide away millions in secret Swiss bank accounts.

Christopher Rusch was found guilty of helping his clients Stephen Kerr and Michael Quiel, both businessmen from Phoenix, hide millions of dollars in secret offshore bank accounts at UBS AG and Pictet & Cie in Switzerland, the US Justice Department said in a statement.

Rusch pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the government and failing to file a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts on February 6, 2013, and was also ordered  to serve three years of supervised release following his prison sentence.

The Justice Department said that Kerr and Quiel, with the assistance of Rusch and others, including Swiss nationals, established nominee foreign entities and corresponding bank accounts in Switzerland to conceal ownership and control of stock and income they deposited in these accounts.

According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, during 2007 and 2008, Kerr and Quiel each failed to report more than $4,600,000 and $2,000,000 of income, respectively, which they hid in the undeclared accounts with Rusch’s assistance.  

Rusch admitted at the trial that he and others caused the sale of the shares of stock through the undeclared accounts. Rusch further testified that, at Kerr and Quiel’s direction, he transferred some of the money in the secret accounts back to the US before dispersing the money for Kerr and Quiel’s benefit, including the purchase of a multi-million dollar golf course in Erie, CO.  

Kerr and Quiel were sentenced in September 2013 to each serve 10 months in prison after both were tried and convicted of filing false income tax returns for 2007 and 2008. The jury also convicted Kerr of failing to file FBARs for 2007 and 2008. 

“We are getting more and more information all the time about offshore banking activities. We are committed to investigating and prosecuting those who continue to evade taxes and reporting requirements. As these sentences show, those who fail to come into compliance risk high penalties and jail,” said assistant attorney general Kathryn Keneally.