PORTLAND — A jury Monday, Nov. 14, found James Millegan, a 65-year-old former securities broker from McMinnville, guilty of evading $2.5 million in income taxes.

He hid his income in multiple bank accounts and submitted false financial statements to the IRS from July 2009 through September 2016, according to federal prosecutors.

Millegan was convicted of one count of tax evasion after a two-week trial.

According to court documents, he owned and operated J.W. Millegan Inc., a small, commission-based investment advisory business that served clients in the Portland and Salem metro areas. From 1996 to 2016, the investment firm was Millegan’s only significant source of income.

During that period, Millegan concealed his income from the Internal Revenue Service by transferring $3.7 million to six bank accounts he controlled, including $1.4 million to the bank account of his deceased mother’s trust, which he used to pay his personal expenses, according to prosecutors.

He used the money to support a lifestyle that included a $4.5 million home in Portland, a $1.3 million home on the Oregon Coast, Rolls Royce and Bentley vehicles, equestrian expenses like stabling and lessons and an attempt to establish a world-class equestrian competition center and resort near Sheridan, according to court documents.

Millegan bought a classic 1938 Rolls Royce touring car, spent $800,000 restoring it and showed it in premier car shows in the United States, Great Britain and Europe, according to prosecutors.

Millegan’s defense lawyers said at the time he was indicted in 2019, he was bankrupt and living in a spare bedroom of a rental house in McMinnville, paid for by his two children.

Oregon Federal Public Defender Lisa Hay said Millegan tried unsuccessfully to resolve his tax debt with the IRS, and in 2011, the agency lost about 100 pages of Millegan’s file.

He spent money freely without sufficient guardrails and took on millions of dollars of personal debt, Hay wrote in a trial brief. His primary home and beach house were foreclosed, and in ensuing years, he disposed of his cars, moved his office to a trailer, sold personal belongings on eBay and shuttered his business, according to Hay.

“He was never able to reach a resolution with the IRS to resolve his tax debt — which had ballooned with penalty and interest — and his hope of ever paying his back taxes was extinguished when his business collapsed,” Hay wrote in a trial brief.

On Monday, Hay said, “We were disappointed in the jury’s verdict and intend to appeal.”

Tax evasion is punishable by up to five years in federal prison. Sentencing before U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut is set for April 3.

Millegan also is scheduled to go to trial on separate wire fraud charges in March.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Seth Uram and Meredith D.M. Bateman prosecuted the case.