UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 05-4656
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
PETER ANTHONY BOND,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western
District of North Carolina, at Charlotte. Richard L. Voorhees,
District Judge. (CR-03-168)
Submitted: April 19, 2006 Decided: May 16, 2006
Before NIEMEYER, MICHAEL, and TRAXLER, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Noell P. Tin, TIN, FULTON, GREENE & OWEN, P.L.L.C., Charlotte,
North Carolina, for Appellant. Gretchen C. F. Shappert, United
States Attorney, Charlotte, North Carolina; Amy E. Ray Assistant
United States Attorney, Asheville, North Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
See Local Rule 36(c).
PER CURIAM:
Peter Anthony Bond pled guilty without benefit of a plea
agreement to one count of tax evasion, 26 U.S.C. § 7201 (2000), and
was sentenced to a term of fifteen months imprisonment. Bond
appeals his sentence, contending that the district court clearly
erred in finding that the offense involved sophisticated
concealment, as defined in U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual
§ 2T1.1(b)(2) (1998), and making a two-level enhancement on that
basis. We affirm.
In the late 1990’s, Bond set up a number of so-called
“pure trusts” and transferred his money and assets into these
trusts with the intent of evading income tax, as he acknowledged in
connection with his guilty plea. Bond professed initially that he
believed income from the trusts was not taxable. Among other
things, he used money from one of the trusts to purchase a
Mercedes-Benz and bought a restaurant with money from another
trust. He also established a Nevada limited liability corporation
which was owned by one of the trusts, and through this company
bought a Cessna aircraft and attempted to buy a helicopter. In
addition, Bond concealed ownership of his home by having another
person buy it in the name of one of his companies. The house was
then sold to Bond’s brother, who rented it to him. Bond also made
extensive use of credit cards which were in his administrative
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assistant’s name. Eventually, when the charges could not be paid,
she was forced to file for bankruptcy.
Prior to sentencing, Bond objected to the probation
officer’s recommendation for an enhancement for sophisticated
concealment. As defined in Application Note 4 to USSG § 2T1.1,
“‘sophisticated concealment’ means especially complex or especially
intricate offense conduct in which deliberate steps are taken to
make the offense, or its extent, difficult to detect.” The
examples provided are: “hiding assets or transactions, or both,
through the use of fictitious entities, corporate shells, or
offshore bank accounts . . . .” (Id.).
At the sentencing hearing, Bond submitted several affidavits
in support of his objection. One was by a forensic accountant who
opined that Bond could have taken more effective steps to hide his
tax evasion, and did not seem to have made any effort to mask his
involvement in the tax evasion scheme. Another was by his
attorney, who said he had advised Bond, when the North Carolina
Department of Revenue was seeking to collect back taxes from Bond,
that he should file amended tax returns that accurately reflected
his income because a “pure trust” was not a legal tax shelter and
that Bond did so. The third affidavit was by Bond’s administrative
assistant, who said she helped set up the trusts, making no effort
to hide Bond’s involvement. She also said that she willingly let
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Bond use credit cards in her name “for business purposes,” and did
not consider herself a victim.
The district court’s determination that Bond used
sophisticated methods of concealment is reviewed for clear error.
United States v. Kontny, 238 F.3d 815, 821 (7th Cir. 2001). Bond
maintains that his use of “pure trusts” did not involve any
concealment, and could not have been sophisticated since these
trusts are marketed to many people. He asserts that his conduct,
including under-reporting and concealing the amount of stock he
owned in certain businesses, did not go beyond the level of
concealment that is inherent in tax evasion. However, because Bond
used trusts and corporations to mask his ownership of automobiles,
an airplane, a restaurant, and his attempted purchase of a
helicopter, we are satisfied that he tried to hide his assets and
he engaged in “deliberate steps . . . to make the offense, or its
extent, difficult to detect.” Therefore, we conclude that the
district court did not clearly err in finding that the enhancement
was warranted in his case.
We therefore affirm the sentence imposed by the district
court. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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