Supreme Court lawyer Tom Goldstein takes stand at his criminal tax trial

By Mike Scarcella

WASHINGTON, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Former longtime U.S. Supreme Court lawyer Tom Goldstein testified in his own defense at his criminal tax trial on Wednesday, saying he never willfully broke the law while maintaining a side career playing multimillion‑dollar poker games.

Answering questions from his lawyer in front of a federal jury in Greenbelt, Maryland, Goldstein admitted to leaving gambling debts off mortgage applications.

"I did not want my wife to know about the scope of my gambling debts," Goldstein told jurors in the courtroom of U.S. District Judge Lydia Griggsby, who has overseen the trial.

Goldstein took the stand on the 16th day of trial in the Washington suburb, where he was indicted last year for allegedly failing to report millions of dollars he won in poker games, lying on mortgage loan documents and making improper payments through his now-defunct law firm Goldstein & Russell.

Griggsby earlier on Wednesday rejected Goldstein’s request that she acquit him now before the jury deliberation phase of the trial. Such requests face a high bar and often fail.

The charges against Goldstein and the alleged details of his gambling exploits stunned the legal community in Washington, where he had risen over two decades to become a central figure in the elite U.S. Supreme Court bar.

Goldstein argued more than 40 cases before the high court before retiring in 2023. He pleaded not guilty last year and has maintained he acted in good faith at all times, relying on his accountants and law office managers for tax and financial matters.

Legal experts have said defendants face risks when they testify at their own trial, since doing so opens them to direct questioning by the prosecution. Goldstein will face prosecutors' questions later on Wednesday or on Thursday after his attorneys finish their direct examination.

Jurors have heard from more than a dozen witnesses so far, including law firm leaders, IRS agents and other poker players in the high-stakes gambling circles Goldstein inhabited.

Prosecutors showed jurors that Goldstein won about $50 million playing poker in 2016 but told his tax preparer about only $27 million. Goldstein, prosecutors allege, lied to the IRS about his 2016 tax return to obscure his poker activities.

Actor and Spider-Man star Tobey Maguire testified last month about hiring Goldstein to help him recover millions of dollars he was owed in poker winnings. Maguire paid Goldstein $500,000 in legal fees, which prosecutors said Goldstein asked Maguire to send to a third-party to cover the lawyer's own poker debts. Maguire is not accused of any wrongdoing.

Jurors also saw snippets of a lengthy profile of Goldstein published in December in The New York Times by legal affairs journalist Jeffrey Toobin.

Goldstein in the article recounted his development as a poker player and described taking steps to conceal his gambling debts from his wife Amy Howe.