Obama bundler helps convicted, alleged financial criminals secure Virgin Islands tax breaks?

Marjorie Rawls Roberts, who has pledged to raise between $100,000 and $200,000 for President Obama’s 2012 campaign, has faced heat in recent months after news reports confirmed that she helps her wealthy clients navigate the kinds of offshore tax benefits the president has publicly criticized. And now The Daily Caller has learned exactly who some of those wealthy clients are.

Roberts helped recently convicted $7 billion ponzi schemer R. Allen Stanford with his application for tax benefits from the U.S. Virgin Islands Economic Development Corporation. Those benefits permit recipients to avoid paying some — or all — of their taxes, as long as they live in the U.S. territory for the majority of a given tax year and fulfill certain financial and development obligations to the local economy.

The Virgin Islands Daily News reported that Stanford applied for those tax breaks in 2006, and that the territory’s current governor, Democrat John de Jongh, approved the application after taking office in 2007.

Stanford, who was convicted of defrauding 30,000 of his investors with bogus investments in his Antiguan bank while living a lavish lifestyle from the spoils of his scheme, owes hundreds of millions in back taxes. In early 2009, the Associated Press reported that the federal government placed four tax liens against Stanford, totaling about $212 million, between 2007 and 2008.