One-time financier C. Arnholt Smith lost a...

One-time financier C. Arnholt Smith lost a last-ditch bid for U.S. Supreme Court review of his tax fraud and embezzlement conviction. Smith, 85, once the ruler of a billion-dollar financial empire based in San Diego, began serving a one-year jail sentence last November after five years of legal maneuvers. He is reported to be working as a gardener on the San Diego County Jail honor farm. The Supreme Court declined to hear arguments by his lawyers that Smith was the victim of discriminatory prosecution and that it was not possible for him to embezzle from his own firm.