“Happiness.” That is what retired auto dealer Jimmy Pflueger told reporters he felt as he left the U.S.District Courthouse today, just after U.S. District Judge Leslie Kobayashi found him “not guilty” on four federal tax fraud charges.

The 87-year-old retired automobile dealer – who founded the Pflueger dealerships – had been charged with filing false tax returns after the U.S. Justice Department said he hid nearly $15 million in a Swiss bank account without paying taxes on the $27.5 million sale of the Hacienda Corporate Plaza in California. The government also initially charged Pflueger with the failure to file a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR), but dropped that charge before trial.

Pflueger’s accountant, Dennis Duban, who has already pled guilty to a related tax fraud charge and to conspiracy of aiding in the filing of a false tax return, testified Pflueger sent his money overseas to protect his assets after he was sued over the breach of his Ka Loko Dam in 2006. The breach killed 7 people and an unborn child. According to the government, Duban and Pflueger engineered the Hacienda sale to effect offshore tax evasion by transferring the proceeds from the sale to a Swiss bank account in order to prevent the proceeds from being used to pay civil claims arising from the 2006 accident. However, Pflueger’s criminal tax attorneys were successful in arguing that Pflueger was not responsible for his IRS tax problems, and that Duban was the sole mastermind of the tax fraud. Read More