Poker Attorney Tom Goldstein Faces New Allegations in Expanded Indictment
Embattled attorney Tom Goldstein faces additional allegations from federal prosecutors in his tax fraud case related to high-stakes poker games.
Goldstein, a prominent attorney and founder of SCOTUSblog, was originally indicted in January on 22 counts, including allegedly falsely omitting his tax and poker debts and making false statements to mortgage lenders.
Last week, the Grand Jury for the District of Maryland returned a superseding indictment alleging that Goldstein had hidden nearly $1 million of his and his wife's money from the IRS.
Additionally, the expanded indictment alleges that Goldstein repeatedly offered cryptocurrency and a $10,000 bonus to a firm manager "at least in part to dissuade her from cooperating with the IRS's ongoing criminal investigation."
While the new document offers additional details about the case, Goldstein, who had previously pleaded not guilty, does not face any new charges.
New Allegations Against Goldstein
One new allegation is related to Goldstein's purchase of a multi-million dollar Washington, D.C. home, which prosecutors previously alleged he was able to fund by concealing his debt to mortgage lenders.
Prosecutors now allege that Goldstein and his wife, Amy Howe, withdrew at least $960,000 from their retirement accounts in March 2021, which Goldstein wired to a company account "to prevent the IRA from levying the funds before he could use them to help purchase the new house."
Prosecutors also more formally accused Goldstein of offering things of value to a potential witness, an accusation levied in previous court documents.
In the new filing, prosecutors say Goldstein "attempt(ed) to dissuade" a firm manager "from cooperating with the IRS" by offering her a $10,000 bonus, student loan repayments in cryptocurrency."
Prosecutors allege that Goldstein did so "at least in part to dissuade the firm manager from cooperating with the IRS's ongoing criminal investigation by, among other things, providing information about a woman whom (Goldstein) caused to be listed as an 'employee'" of his law firm.
Prosecutors also revised some dates in the indictment, including the year that Goldstein allegedly helped a Hollywood actor recover his poker winnings from a Texas billionaire. The original indictment said the actor retained Goldstein as an attorney in 2021, while the superseding indictment says he did so in 2020.
In addition to pleading not guilty to the charges against him, Goldstein has filed several motions to dismiss the charges and accused prosecutors of "intentionally" misleading the court.
On Aug. 8, a deputy clerk uploaded a notice of a related case, though no documents or information about the related case were made available.
Goldstein's attorneys, Jonathan Kravis, Stephanie Reaves, and Adeel Mohammadi, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
