A tax lawyer was sentenced Tuesday in Paris to a one-year suspended prison sentence and a temporary ban on practicing for having helped a couple to evade taxes between 2007 and 2014 via the companies of these clients in Luxembourg.
During an appearance hearing on prior recognition of guilt (CRPC) at the Paris court, a sort of French plea, he admitted the charges, namely money laundering and complicity in tax evasion for the benefit of a rich couple of owners of commercial walls, managing a hundred companies.
He accepted the sentence negotiated between his lawyers and the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF): one year’s suspended prison sentence, 18 months’ ban on practicing, of which 14 are suspended and a 50,000 euro criminal fine. A judge then homologated this sentence.
During the hearing, the prosecutor Aurlien Ltocart pointed out that the investigation, entrusted to the National Brigade for the Repression of Tax Crime (BNRDF) and triggered by a complaint from the tax administration in 2012, had brought to light a vast fraud tax, one of the most complex and important in the PNF when it comes to an individual, in the form of social and tax cavalry.
The couple in question, still the subject of a preliminary investigation, found themselves at the head of an informal group of several hundred companies, the management of which enabled them to have an expensive lifestyle and to evade income tax. in France through two legal professionals, this lawyer and a deceased notary who had lost their ethical bearings.
According to the prosecution, the lawyer refrained from verifying the merits of the requests of his client, who was doing his best not to leave assets in French companies absorbed by Luxembourg companies. However, he did not enrich himself personally.
According to his lawyer, Me Kiril Bougartchev, he was vampirized by a man who didn’t tell him everything (..), he didn’t have the whole truth.
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The defendant was a young 27-year-old collaborator when his firm entrusted him with these clients in 2007.
Mid-length hair and a blue suit, the lawyer explained to the bar that his client was extremely indebted, that his objective was to repay his creditors so that the group could get out of it and not a money laundering objective.
The couple in question allegedly cheated the tax authorities for 10 to 20 million euros over the period, according to a source familiar with the matter. His companies were failing, but maintained artificially to obtain loans and invest in real estate.