Ex-U.S. lawyers found guilty in tax shelter fraud

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Two former lawyers were found guilty by a New York jury for hatching a conspiracy to fraudulently obtain referral fees using a tax shelter with the acronym HOMER, U.S. prosecutors said on Thursday.

The office of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney said in a statement that Chicago lawyer and accountant John Ohle, 42, and Louisiana lawyer William Bradley, 46, each face a maximum of five years in prison and fines when they are sentenced in September.

Evidence presented at a three-week long Manhattan federal court trial that ended on Wednesday said that, between 1999 and 2002, Ohle was a supervisor in Chicago of a Bank One office called the "Innovative Strategies Group." It provided estate planning and tax shelter strategies for high net worth clients, including a tax shelter called "Hedge Option Monetization of Economic Remainder," or HOMER.

Ohle and Bradley were indicted in 2008 on wire fraud and tax fraud conspiracy fraud charges.

Ohle, who was paid more than $800,000 in fraudulently obtained referral fees, was also found guilty of two counts of tax evasion that encompassed failure to report more than $4 million he embezzled from a trust, the jury found.

He also faces the forfeiture of a multimillion-dollar sports memorabilia collection, which prosecutors said Ohle bought with money he made in the fraud.

The case is USA v Ohle et al, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, No. 08-1109.

(Reporting by Grant McCool; editing by Andre Grenon)