Wall Avenue con man Daniel Gordon dodges $59M NY tax invoice, lives it up in Calif.

A convicted Wall Avenue swindler who was named New York’s No. 1 tax deadbeat a decade in the past has been dwelling it up in California, operating a charity praised by Gov. Gavin Newsom and hawking erectile dysfunction capsules — all whereas dodging a tax invoice that has soared to $59.1 million, The Put up has discovered.

Daniel Gordon — an ex-Merrill Lynch dealer who pleaded responsible in 2003 to bilking the financial institution out of $43 million in a brazen wire fraud scheme — lives together with his spouse, Kate, in a ten,495-square-foot unfold close to Palm Springs, Calif. that’s price greater than $5 million, state tax information present.

The sprawling compound in Rancho Mirage — a complicated desert enclave whose residents have included Frank Sinatra, Invoice Gates and President Gerald Ford — boasts a sunken tennis court docket, a three-hole placing inexperienced and a resort-style pool with cascading waterfalls and a swim-up bar, in keeping with a realtor itemizing.

In the meantime, 50-year-old Gordon has reinvented himself as a Golden State philanthropist. He operates a jail reform charity referred to as Gordon Philanthropies, doing TV interviews and photo-ops with LAPD and the California Division of Corrections and plastering his web site with images of him smiling at ribbon-cuttings and charitable occasions.

In November 2024, Gordon even acquired a gushing letter of reward from Gov. Newsom, who addressed the letter to “Daniel” and added a big, handwritten “Thanks!” along with his signature on the backside. The missive is proudly displayed on his charity’s Fb web page.

“Thanks once more in your beneficiant contributions,” Newsom wrote. “I sit up for your continued partnership.”

Gordon and Newsom’s workplace didn’t reply to requests for remark. California jail officers ignored The Put up’s questions on Gordon’s legal previous and towering tax tab, pointing as a substitute to guidelines that allow them take personal items.

All of this comes after New York tax enforcers singled out Gordon in 2016 because the state’s largest tax dodger on its “High 100” checklist with $25.1 million in excellent warrants — and pledging to The Put up that they might hunt him down and make him pay.

A decade later, two lively Albany County tax warrants in opposition to Gordon stand at a mixed $59,141,763.16.

The staggering sum is tied on to Gordon’s tried Merrill Lynch heist, by which the then-24-year-old Yale grad famously tricked his bosses into wiring $43 million into an offshore shell firm, pocketing the money in a phony insurance coverage deal.

After Gordon was ordered in 2003 to give up the fortune he embezzled, Uncle Sam and Albany demanded their minimize, too, as stolen loot additionally counts as taxable revenue. The tab has since ballooned with compounding curiosity and penalties.

Throughout his 2013 chapter trial, the cash man admitted underneath oath to dodging over $34 million in again taxes and testified the IRS gave him a blunt actuality verify about his stolen Merrill loot regardless of the very fact he had returned the $43 million: “Underneath our legal guidelines you owe us taxes … no matter the truth that it was repaid.”

His legal pleas didn’t wipe the slate clear, and when tax collectors refused to again down, Gordon fled to chapter court docket.

In a blistering 2015 determination, US Chapter Decide Robert E. Gerber denied Gordon’s bid to wipe out his private money owed in a Chapter 7 submitting, ruling that the previous Wall Streeter had fraudulently hidden $3.1 million in property and lied underneath oath, providing excuses that “insulted the intelligence of the court docket.”

In the course of the trial, it emerged that Gordon had wired $2 million to a phantom Nevada shell firm with no workers, workplace, or ledgers. A surprised Decide Gerber additionally halted questioning when Gordon’s lawyer confirmed he charged former New York Knicks heart Eddy Curry 89.79% curiosity on a $570,000 mortgage — inflicting it to balloon right into a $2 million debt in simply 18 months.

Gordon claimed through the trial he had simply $3,147 to his identify. But he admitted dwelling in a $19,000-a-month Higher East Aspect residence and dropping $140,000 on a Hamptons summer time rental, hiding town lease behind a company shell.

Regardless of media frenzies sparked by Gordon’s case, state officers nonetheless haven’t filed the routine paperwork to gather Gordon’s towering tax debt. That’s additionally regardless of getting tipped off by a whistleblower greater than two years in the past, The Put up has discovered.

Leaked emails obtained by The Put up reveal state investigators didn’t make a transfer even after they had been handed an in depth roadmap to greater than $26 million of Gordon’s alleged holdings.

In March 2024, a whistleblower despatched a string of tricks to the Division of Taxation and Finance’s inner affairs wing. The tipster, a Texas entrepreneur who requested anonymity as a result of dying threats, has been locked in a bitter court docket battle with Gordon.

The whistleblower flagged “$4.1mm {dollars} in non-exempt California Actual Property along with the 22mm price of shares of inventory in public corporations,” in keeping with one e mail.

“I would like the state of New York, at the least, to get their a reimbursement,” the tipster wrote.

The tipster even pointed state investigators to an tackle proper in their very own yard: a inventory switch agent at 1 State St. in Decrease Manhattan holding shares tied to a Gordon-linked company car.

A New York tax investigator, recognized within the messages solely as Inv. Politylo, replied promising to “ahead this to the suitable division.”

Greater than two years later, nevertheless, county information present New York has but to file a single lien in opposition to the Rancho Mirage mansion. Empire State tax warrants expire after 20 years, which means Albany has already blown half the clock to gather.

Darren Dopp, a spokesman for the New York Division of Taxation and Finance, declined to touch upon what efforts the company underneath Gov. Kathy Hochul has made to gather the $59.1 million, citing state tax secrecy legal guidelines.

Due to a bureaucratic rule, New York drops deadbeats from its “High 100” checklist if officers fail to file a contemporary warrant in 12 months, Dopp mentioned. Debtors may drop off the checklist by difficult an evaluation, chopping a deal, dying, or declaring chapter.

Edward Zelinsky, a tax professor at Yeshiva College’s Cardozo College of Regulation, mentioned monitoring down Gordon’s California property must be simple for New York’s prime legal professionals.

“That is actually one thing that must be inside the routine competence of the New York lawyer normal, significantly for big judgments the place it will be financially possible to accumulate assist from counsel within the different state,” he mentioned.

A spokesperson for New York Lawyer Basic Letitia James insisted the state’s prime prosecutor can’t carry a finger until tax officers formally hand over the file.

“The Division of Taxation and Finance is the first enforcement company in issues involving excellent public tax money owed until a referral is made to the Workplace of the Lawyer Basic,” James spokeswoman Alexis Richards mentioned.

“Per the Put up’s personal reporting, the Division issued warrants for Mr. Gordon’s state tax money owed. That’s the finish of the story right here, however sadly The Put up appears decided to disparage the crucial work the Workplace of the Lawyer Basic does daily to guard New Yorkers and their wallets,” she added.

The Tax Division, for its half, claimed it by no means sends assortment circumstances to James’ workplace.

“The AG’s workplace isn’t concerned within the case,” Dopp mentioned. “The AG’s workplace doesn’t deal with our collections issues.”

“It’s very uncommon,” added Timothy Noonan, a accomplice at Hodgson Russ LLP. “I might suppose a taxpayer like that will be excessive on the radar display screen.”

When tax deadbeats flee the state, tax authorities “can authorize the Lawyer Basic to pursue assortment wherever else,” Noonan mentioned. Particularly, by “domesticating the warrant” in California, Albany might flip its New York tax tab into an area court docket judgment in a single day, freeze Gordon’s financial institution accounts and seize his desert mansion, Noonan mentioned.

Usually, there is no such thing as a regulation that forestalls the AG and the tax division from selecting up the cellphone to coordinate, mentioned Steven Goldburd, a managing accomplice at Manhattan tax agency Goldburd McCone LLP.

“Governments are all about going after low-hanging fruit,” he mentioned. “It’s infinitely simpler to assault a $2,000 tax invoice of a taxpayer that may possible by no means battle again than the multimillion-dollar tax invoice of a legally well-armed taxpayer that may.”

Nonetheless, whereas a rich tax dodger can make use of high-priced consultants to protect themselves from assortment and delay enforcement, “an LLC is a authorized barrier, not a magic cloak,” former Manhattan DA asset forfeiture chief Duncan Levin advised The Put up.

“New York can not merely seize firm property to pay an proprietor’s private tax invoice,” Levin mentioned. “But when the corporate is actually his private piggy financial institution, that barrier could come down.”

Levin added that Gordon’s California palace may very well be a a lot simpler goal as a result of it sits in his personal identify, although seizing actual property requires a court docket order.

“A $5 million home isn’t a $5 million verify,” Levin mentioned. “The state’s job is to show a tax warrant right into a restoration. You don’t accumulate a debt by admiring the dimensions of it.”

In the meantime, Gordon stays busy in California. Company filings present his charity, his penny inventory outfit Polomar Well being Companies, and his GLD Companions funding arm all function out of the identical Los Angeles workplace suite.

SEC information present he holds 49% voting management at Polomar, which lately spent greater than $193,000 shopping for “Wafesil” — a dissolving sildenafil erection drug — instantly from one other agency Gordon controls.

Disclosures reveal Polomar has additionally been pushing an “inhalable sildenafil” program: primarily an asthma-style rescue inhaler loaded with generic Viagra.