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Attorneys suggest high-end sentence
YOUNGSTOWN
A prominent Cleveland lawyer and former Ohio State Bar Association president who pleaded guilty to evading $75,385 in taxes by filing false federal income-tax returns should get a prison term at or near the high end of the 10- to 16-month sentencing guideline range, the U.S. attorney said.
However, defense lawyers for Atty. Leslie W. Jacobs told the judge that half of Jacobs’ sentence could consist of probation, including house arrest.
The statements were made in sentencing memoranda filed this week with U.S. District Judge Benita Y. Pearson, who will sentence Jacobs at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday in federal court in Youngstown.
Jacobs, 67, a Harvard Law School graduate, pleaded guilty in November to filing false personal federal income-tax returns for 2004 through 2007.
Assistant U.S. attorneys John M. Siegel and Rebecca C. Lutzko recommended the high-end sentence because they said Jacobs lied to IRS agents during the audit and criminal probe that led to the tax-falsification charge.
Between 2004 and 2006, Jacobs fraudulently deducted about $103,000 worth of purported business expenses, for which his law firm, Thompson-Hine LLP, reimbursed him and for which he incurred “no net out-of-pocket expense,” the federal prosecutors said.
However, Jacobs denied to an IRS agent that he had been reimbursed, Siegel said during the plea hearing.
Over four years, Jacobs illegally deducted $24,500 worth of private fishing-club dues as law-firm business expenses, knowing that club dues are not deductible, the assistant U.S. attorneys said.
He also improperly deducted about $10,000 in party and guest-room charges at a private club for his son’s 2004 wedding rehearsal dinner, the prosecutors said.
“This is a tragic case of a good man who did something wrong,” wrote defense lawyers Niki Z. and Jennifer E. Schwartz and Brian P. Downey.
The defense lawyers cited Jacobs’ exemplary law practice, professional organization and community-service record, including his service as OSBA president in 1986-87.
Jacobs, who has no prior criminal record, will deliver a $75,385 restitution check to the IRS when he is sentenced, they said.
They also asked Judge Pearson to consider that Jacobs’ felony conviction will result in his being punished by the loss of his law license and $550,000 in annual law-practice income.
Attached to the defense memorandum were more than 150 letters to the judge praising Jacobs and urging leniency in sentencing.
In his letter, former Mahoning County Bar Association president David C. Comstock called Jacobs’ legal troubles “a sad chapter in an otherwise remarkable life.”