Mogul Sentenced to 9 Years For Tax Evasion and Fraud

Anderson, 53, pleaded guilty in September to tax evasion and defrauding the government. The central issue at his sentencing hearing was how much more time he would serve behind bars. He has been at the D.C. jail since his arrest at Dulles Airport in February 2005, although the average stay in the jail is four days.

Anderson admitted receiving more than $126 million in 1998. That year, he claimed he earned $67,939 on his federal return and paid $495 in taxes.

"He thought he was too clever by half and he could avoid paying his share of taxes," his former tax accountant, John Kilday, told the court. "In that way, he was no different than many of my business clients."

Before the guilty plea, Anderson had insisted that the hundreds of millions of dollars in assets the government said he had hidden belonged to the Smaller World Foundation. He controls the foundation and endowed it with full ownership of various companies he also runs, such as Space Inc. and Iceberg Transport SA. He said he planned for the foundation to begin giving away money in 2006 to promote such causes as world peace, family planning and space exploration, but then he was arrested.

In a lengthy jailhouse interview with The Washington Post in 2005, he asserted his innocence.

"I don't need to steal money from the U.S. government to be successful," Anderson said. "I don't want their money."

Yesterday marked a sad moment in the life of the wildly successful but eccentric Anderson, who never graduated from college and made millions when he took his first company public. He gave away and lost millions, and the government cannot find any major assets to seize for unpaid taxes. He is represented at taxpayer expense by the court-appointed federal public defender and declared personal bankruptcy in the same courthouse where he faced criminal charges.

He owned part of a private plane and bought a $5 million mansion outside Madrid, but his favorite lunchtime hangout was Rumors, where he usually ordered a cheeseburger and iced tea.

Anderson grew up in Silver Spring and graduated in 1971 from W.T. Woodson High School in Fairfax. He was one of the original employees of MCI Corp. and founded a series of telecommunications companies, including Mid Atlantic Telecom Inc., Esprit Telecom Group PLC and Telco Communications Group Inc. It was Telco company that made him a multimillionaire overnight. It was also at that time, prosecutors said, when he began hiding his income.

"There's no chance I'll be before you again," Anderson told the judge. "Next time I set up any organization, I will get an unbelievable amount of legal advice."