Strongsville dentist with home in Columbia Township guilty of attempted tax evasion

A Strongsville dentist was convicted in federal court Tuesday on charges that he tried to hide assets, including property in Columbia Township, from the IRS as part of a scheme to avoid paying taxes for at least 12 out of the last 18 years. Douglas Smith, 68, was convicted by a jury on four counts of attempting to evade payment of income taxes for the tax years 2004-2012 and 2014-2017 after a three-day trial before U.S. District Judge Dan Aaron Polster, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Ohio announced. Charges of bankruptcy fraud and concealment of bankruptcy assets were dismissed by federal prosecutors prior to Smith's trial, according to federal court records. He will be sentenced in February, according to federal prosecutors. The case was investigated by IRS Criminal Investigations. Polster also found Smith in contempt of a court order and sentenced him to three months in jail for improperly serving the prosecutor in the case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Patton, with an "unrelated and improper document" after previously being warned not to do so. It was the second time Polster had sanctioned Smith for contempt. He had previously sentenced Smith to three months in jail for violating a court order regarding Smith's trial exhibit list on Oct. 11, according to federal court records. According to federal court documents and trial evidence, Smith, a licensed dentist in the state of Ohio, attempted to evade paying income taxes for the tax years 2004 to 2012 from March 2006 to July 2016. Smith put his assets, including a home in Columbia Township, into a trust to try and avoid taxes. He also purchased gold bars and coins and filed for bankruptcy, according to federal prosecutors. From 2014 to 2017, Smith again attempted to evade paying income taxes by depositing his paychecks in the bank account of a second holding trust, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Federal prosecutors presented evidence at trial showing Smith had failed to file income tax returns since 1992 and owed more than $490,000 in back taxes and penalties to the IRS. Around 2006, Smith began to transfer his assets into a trust that he controlled to evade the collection of taxes and payment of his mortgage, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. In April 2008 and March 2009, the IRS went after Smith to collect back taxes. It filed a tax lien against him and his trust with the Lorain County Recorder's Office in October 2010, and in August 2011 sent him another letter saying it planned to seize and sell his assets to cover back taxes, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. In January 2012, federal agents seized approximately $250,000 in cash, gold bars, gold and silver coins from Smith's Columbia Township home for nonpayment of income taxes. Smith then tried to transfer assets including the home to a second trust to prevent the collection and avoid foreclosure, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Smith later filed for bankruptcy and continued to try and hide his assets from the IRS, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Allegations in federal court records were that Smith claimed he made only $858 per month in wages, concealing his true earned income from work as a licensed dentist. He also allegedly concealed from U.S. Bankruptcy Court his ownership of the Columbia Township residence valued at $155,000, more than $19,000 in cash in a bag in his closet, silver coins worth between $8,000 and $10,000, and firearms of an unknown value, according to federal court records. After being charged in federal court, Smith attempted to have Polster removed as judge on his case in January, citing alleged misconduct. That same month, he sued two federal court clerks for $1 million for alleged "failure to complete legally required tasks" and "judicial misconduct." Both of those complaints were dismissed by U.S. District Judge Solomon Oliver in March, according to federal court records.