Prominent Chevy Chase lawyer sentenced for tax evasion, other financial crimes

Prominent attorney and co-founder of SCOTUSblog Thomas C. Goldstein was sentenced Friday to 72 months in prison following his conviction for mortgage fraud and tax crimes.

U.S. District Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby revoked his bond, and he was immediately remanded into custody. She also ruled that he serve five years of supervised release, pay $3,103, 427 in restitution and forfeit an indeterminate amount. 

“Thomas Goldstein built a distinguished legal career arguing that the rule of law matters. Yet, as the evidence at trial showed, he repeatedly chose to violate that very principle for his own financial benefit,” Kelly O. Hayes, the U.S. attorney for the District of Maryland, said in a statement. “Every taxpayer is expected to play by the same rules, and this sentence shows that those who deliberately cheat the system and lie for financial gain will be held accountable.”

Stuart Berman, an attorney at the Bethesda-based law firm Lerch, Early & Brewer and a member of Goldstein’s legal team, declined to comment.

A Chevy Chase resident, Goldstein was convicted by a federal jury in February of financial crimes tied to his proclivity for playing high-stakes poker, including tax evasion, assisting in the preparation of false tax returns, willful failure to timely pay taxes and making false statements to mortgage lenders. He was indicted in 2025 when federal prosecutors alleged that he failed to report millions of dollars in poker winnings, lied on mortgage loan documents and made improper payments through the boutique law firm Goldstein & Russell, of which he was the sole owner.

Actor Tobey Maguire of the “Spiderman” movie franchise served as a witness during the seven-week trial, telling jurors that he hired Goldstein in 2020 in an attempt recover over $7 million in poker debt that Texas businessman allegedly owed him.

Goldstein was found guilty of 12 of the 16 charges brought against him and faced up to five years for tax evasion, up to 30 years for alleged false statements to mortgage lenders and potential additional prison time for assisting in the preparation of false tax returns and willful failure to pay taxes.

Between 2016 and 2024, Goldstein, who had argued more than 40 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, repeatedly flouted the law by not paying his taxes on time and engaged in a tax evasion scheme for his 2016 filing by hiding millions of dollars in poker winnings from the federal government and his accountants. He reportedly diverted legal fees to his personal bank account to fulfill poker-related debts, directed people to pay his creditors rather than sending payments to him, channeled winnings through foreign bank accounts and falsely classified personal payments for poker debts as “legal-fee” expenses on his firm’s books and records.

“Mr. Goldstein concealed millions of dollars in income, disguised income with foreign bank accounts, and manipulated his law firm’s books — all to fund his gambling and lifestyle. He then repeatedly chose not to pay taxes owed,” Colin M. McDonald, an assistant attorney general for the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Fraud Enforcement Division, said in a statement. “There is no tax case too big, no scheme too complex, and no hiding place too remote for the Fraud Division.”

Additionally, Goldstein submitted false applications in 2021 to two different mortgage lending companies as he sought financing to purchase a $2.6 million home in Washington, D.C., according to a news release from the Justice Department. On the mortgage applications, Goldstein failed to disclose millions in financial liabilities, including money he owed in taxes to the IRS and more than $14 million in poker debts.

False statements Goldstein submitted to one of the two lending companies allowed him to secure a $1.98 million loan, the release says.

This story has been updated with Berman’s decline to comment.