Attorney Sam McCloud, known for his outsized personality and his ability to get clients and himself out of legal jams, showed little of his trademark brashness in federal court in Minneapolis on Thursday as he quietly accepted an 18-month prison sentence for tax evasion.
McCloud, 68, of Shakopee, wearing a dark suit, his white hair flowing to his shoulders, opted to say nothing to U.S. District Judge Patrick Schiltz before he was sentenced.
His attorney, Ryan Garry, told the judge that his client, a father of 10 who for 37 years has fought for clients and worked for free on nearly all of the 150 appeals he argued, is remorseful for failing to report nearly $600,000 in income from 2004 to 2006.
McCloud pled guilty in December to a single count of felony tax evasion.
Garry asked for five years probation instead of the 24- to 30-month sentence recommended by guidelines. Garry, in a 61-page memo to the court, sketched details of McCloud's life, including a stay in an orphanage, five failed marriages, an esteemed career as a legal trailblazer, and the looming home foreclosure that Garry said led McCloud to commit his crime.
Garry told Schiltz that the humiliation McCloud feels has been a punishment of its own.
"He's a legend that has fallen, but he will once again rise," Garry said. "He will win the respect of his family and colleagues once again."
The sentence includes two years of supervised release after confinement. McCloud also was ordered to pay back taxes, with interest, to the government.
