UBS tax dodger is sentenced

The first US client of UBS AG prosecuted in the US government’s wide-ranging offshore tax-evasion probe was sentenced yesterday to three years of probation and a year of home-confinement.

Defendant Steven Michael Rubinstein, a Florida accountant, also was ordered to pay a $40,000 criminal fine.

The sentence was lighter than the recommendation of prosecutors, who sought a one-year prison term for Rubinstein.

He faced a possible sentence of 18 to 24 months under advisory sentencing guidelines.

Rubinstein was sentenced in a Florida federal court for filing a false tax return. Prosecutors charged him in April and he pleaded guilty in June.

Prosecutors said Rubinstein communicated with UBS bankers from 2001 to 2008 about the purchase and sale of securities worth more than 4.5 million Swiss Francs.