Bruce Vielmetti

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Paul Bouraxis immigrated to the United States from Greece when he was 17 and got started in the restaurant business. With only a fifth-grade education, he never learned to read and write English, yet by the time he was in his 60s, he was a millionaire with three successful Milwaukee-area restaurants.

The achievement took years of long hours and hard work, but also got a boost from something less laudable.

"He took all the advantages the U.S. had to offer," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Jacobs, "but repaid the country by cheating."

Bouraxis, 67, was sentenced Thursday to two years in federal prison for conspiring with his wife and son to skim millions in cash from receipts at his restaurants, failing to report much of that as income and shorting payroll taxes by paying workers in cash.

When Bouraxis gets out, his son Andreas, 40, will serve a year and a day. Meanwhile, Freida Bouraxis, 61, Paul's wife and Andreas' mother, will serve three years probation, with six months of house arrest.

Andreas Bouraxis was earning $3 million a year, Jacobs said, yet "didn't want to pay his fair share" of taxes, undermining the public's perception of the whole system.

His brother-in-law Reiad "Ray" Awadallah, 45, a manager at one of the family restaurants who was not part of the conspiracy but cheated on his taxes because of the cash wages, will serve the same sentence. He has already paid the IRS about $39,000.

Jenny Johnson, Paul Bouraxis' attorney, told U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman that as her client learned the restaurant business, "he saw the ways others cut corners to increase profits and lost sight of the right way."

Even as he prospered, Johnson said, Bouraxis didn't stop to adjust his behavior but instead taught it to his wife and son.

Adelman noted at one point that the recent economic crisis in Bouraxis' native Greece resulted, in part, from citizens not paying their taxes.

"It's a serious offense," he said. "The country can't function without people honoring their tax obligations."

Adelman allowed Bouraxis and his son to serve staggered prison terms so that one of them will always be around to oversee the restaurants, which employ more than 130 workers. Paul Bouraxis was allowed to voluntarily surrender to begin whenever the federal Bureau of Prisons assigns him, probably in 45 to 60 days.

The Bouraxis family operate Omega Burger in Milwaukee, El Fuego in Franklin and El Beso in Greenfield. Prosecutors say they skimmed more than $3 million from cash receipts.

All were charged in 2015, and reached plea agreements earlier this year. In addition to the conspiracy count, Paul Bouraxis also agreed to plead guilty to tax evasion for his 2010 personal income tax returns.

The couple and their son are jointly responsible for about $1.4 million in restitution. With penalties and interest, they will owe more than $3 million, money the government expects to recover from family assets.

Agents seized about $1.7 million in cash, gold, silver bullion and jewelry during a raid in 2012. As part of their plea agreements, the family agreed to forfeit $442,000 of that, and apply the rest to unpaid taxes, penalties and interest. Prosecutors had filed a civil action to forfeit the assets.

Through the 1990s and 2000s, Associated Bank lent Paul Bouraxis about $10 million for various business and real estate ventures. Around 2009, the bank became concerned about his ability to make payments and agreed not to foreclose for several months, but in 2010 finally sold off the loans at a big loss.

As part of the plea deal, bank fraud charges against Paul Bouraxis were dismissed.

All that time, investigators contend, Paul Bouraxis was socking away cash from the restaurants and the loan repayments, spending some on Rolex watches and dozens of pieces of expensive jewelry, including a ring appraised at $39,000.

Authorities found $1 million in cash in safe at El Beso and another $2 million in Greek and other European bank accounts.

When the IRS announced charges against the Bouraxises in 2015, the government also charged the owner of a different Omega restaurant, on S. 27th St. in Milwaukee, with similar crimes.

Gus Koutromanos, 69, pleaded guilty to one count of tax evasion and was sentenced in September to three years probation and ordered to pay the IRS more than $200,000 in back taxes and penalties.