March 16 (Bloomberg) -- Investors in R. Allen Stanford’s Antiguan bank may have to get in line behind the Internal Revenue Service as they seek to recover money from the alleged swindler.

The IRS asked a judge to let it continue to seek at least $226.6 million in back taxes from Stanford, the Texas financier accused of running an $8 billion Ponzi scheme.

The motion was filed on March 13 in the U.S. District Court in Dallas, where a court-appointed receiver is sorting out claims for more than $1 billion in assets frozen in customer accounts and in gold coins and bullion seized last month.

“The IRS shall file a fairly significant claim against R. Allen Stanford,” agency lawyer Manuel Lena Jr. wrote in the so- called motion to intervene in the case brought against Stanford by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Stanford’s federal tax bill has swelled to twice the amount previously reported as penalties and interest piled up, and it may grow further because Stanford hasn’t filed his 2007 tax return, Lena said in the court filing.

Ralph Janvey, the court-appointed receiver, will file his response in court today, answering more than 45 groups of investors that have requested permission to join the SEC’s case against Stanford and his companies.

Janvey has already released $4.1 billion in frozen Stanford investor accounts. Only accounts linked to certain executives and employees, the bullion division, and accounts containing investments at Antiguan-based Stanford International Bank remain under the court-ordered freeze.

Assets Frozen

A federal judge in Dallas has frozen Stanford’s assets and placed his U.S. operations into receivership. Chuck Meadows, an attorney who said he was representing the banker in the asset freeze, told the judge March 2 that the banker denied the Ponzi- scheme allegations. Stanford invoked his right against self- incrimination under the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, according to papers filed in the court March 11.

Lena’s motion was filed a day before federal authorities moved a 120-foot yacht said to belong to Stanford, the Sea Eagle, from St. Croix’s Gallows Bay to St. Thomas, both in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Stanford has claimed residence in the U.S. Virgin Islands since 2006. By law he is required to file his tax returns with the territorial Virgin Islands Internal Revenue Bureau, not with the IRS, which has the right to audit the returns. It isn’t known whether Stanford filed returns with the territorial tax collector.

The Sea Eagle departed Gallows Bay March 14 with a U.S. marshal aboard. The yacht, which people close to the situation identified as belonging to Stanford, is being moved to St. Thomas’ Yacht Haven Grande, where it can blend in better with large vessels docked there, said Ronnie Schang, an aide to U.S. Virgin Islands Governor John de Jongh.

Leaves Christiansted

U.S. Deputy Marshal Charlene Sedar, along with an unidentified representative from Janvey’s Dallas law office, boarded the Sea Eagle with its crew at about 8:30 a.m. The yacht left under blue skies dotted with cumulus clouds shortly after 9 a.m., leaving the Danish colonial town of Christiansted. Sedar declined to comment.

Stanford’s exit is bittersweet for St. Croix, said de Jongh and others who dealt with the man, who only months ago was promising to invest billions on an island where 30 percent of the people live in poverty and per capita income is $13,139.

Caribbean Sea

Now, dozens of Stanford’s workers are unemployed, including some who relocated to the island from the mainland. Construction of offices and a mansion on one of St. Croix’s highest peaks overlooking the Caribbean Sea has stopped.

“I’m disappointed,” de Jongh said in an interview at Government House in Christiansted, St. Croix’s largest town. “Clearly he was a large player within the Caribbean, but also I’m very disappointed from the standpoint of the number of Virgin Islands families that are affected.”

The Sea Eagle, registered in the Marshall Islands but flying a tiny Virgin Islands flag from its mast, is the largest private boat in the St. Croix marina, said Virginia Angus, vice president of the St. Croix Marine. At $12.50 per foot, its docking charges total about $1,500 per day, plus the cost of electricity, she said.

“We didn’t get paid yet,” said Angus, who is seeking reimbursement from the court-appointed receiver. She declined to say how much the marina is owed.

The gleaming white yacht, which is also equipped for deep- sea fishing, has been under 24-hour watch by St. Croix police since a contractor boarded it in search of valuables to settle an unpaid bill, soon after the U.S. government accused Stanford of running a Ponzi scheme.

Project Imploded

It was among the most visible signs of Stanford’s presence in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he was trying to replicate an empire he built in the Caribbean nation of Antigua for the past two years. That project also imploded since the U.S. accused him of running a “massive ongoing fraud.” He hasn’t been charged with a crime.

On Feb. 27, the parliament of Antigua and Barbuda voted in an emergency session to seize 254 acres of Stanford’s land, according to Wendy Gordon, a spokeswoman for Prime Minister Winston Baldwin Spencer. The move was intended to preserve 800 jobs, the government said in a news release. Financial authorities also took over the Stanford-owned Bank of Antigua and Stanford International.

Stanford was attracted to St. Croix by an economic development program that would have allowed him to reduce his personal federal tax liability by 90 percent once he invested enough money and met other qualifications. He was approved for the benefits but was never issued a certificate required to actually claim them. De Jongh said Stanford asked the government to change its rules to qualify more of his income for the benefits once he received them, a request that was denied.

Growing Tax Bill

Stanford arrived in the Virgin Islands months after suing the IRS in February 2006 to contest a tax bill for 1999-2003 that had grown to $104.2 million by August 2008, according to liens on his properties in Florida and Texas. Lena said in court papers the IRS had also placed liens on his assets in St. Croix.

De Jongh and others said that while Stanford made his corporate presence known on the island, the man himself was less visible.

“He didn’t seem to immerse himself much in the community,” de Jongh said.

To contact the reporters on this story: Ryan J. Donmoyer in St. Croix at rdonmoyer@bloomberg.net; Laurel Brubaker Calkins in Dallas at

Last Updated: March 16, 2009 00:01 EDT