Former Sonoma County developer sentenced to three years for tax evasion

Former Sonoma County developer and savings and loan officer Jay Scott Soderling, whose history of financial fraud dates back to the mid-1980s, was sentenced July 5 to three years in federal prison for tax evasion and conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government by hiding assets, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

The Santa Rosa man and his wife, Jessica Lynn Soderling, were convicted after a five-day trial in December of shifting money into different accounts to avoid detection, thus allowing him to claim he could not pay $90,000 in back taxes even as he purchased a luxury sports car and a boat, authorities said.

Soderling’s trail of deceit dates back at least to the 1980s when he and his brother were convicted of looting $16.5 million from investors in their company, Golden Pacific Savings and Loan. He has served at least two stints in federal prison already. Soderling will serve three years of supervised probation and has been ordered to pay restitution of $345,697, federal authorities said.

Jessica Soderling, convicted of a single count of conspiracy, was sentenced in April to three months of probation and ordered to pay restitution of $153,242, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

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