For nearly a decade, six-figure checks were cut, picked up and cashed by representatives of a cluster of businesses using the name of a Catholic saint named Bellarmine.

On Thursday, federal officials said the alleged owners of those companies were no angels.

As first reported by The Examiner in early November, “Bellarmine” is a name that recurs throughout the largest public corruption scandal in city history.

Authorities alleged in charging documents that Robert O. and Patricia Anne Steven opened at least two Bank of America accounts for “Bellarmine Designs” on which they were each signatories. The company would net about $2.8 million in phony tax refunds in the unholy scheme, authorities alleged.

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The earliest known payment to Bellarmine dates to July 1, 1999, when tax officials wrote a $113,000 check to “Bellarmine Corporation,” left for pickup at the tax office in the care of Prem Malkani.

Malkani, a retired finance officer with the Air Line Pilots Association, said the payment “was entirely false.”

“I have no association with any company or business of that name,” he told The Examiner.

Through the next several years, authorities alleged, “Bellarmine” would be associated with at least 11 payments, including a June 9, 2000, check for more than $181,000, made out to “Bellarmine Associates” and put in care of real estate lawyer Jeffrey Nadel.

“Never heard of them,” Nadel told The Examiner.

The tax scam now dates back to at least 1990 and has involved such phony companies as “Legna” and “Provident Home Services.”

Robert Bellarmine was a Roman Catholic scholar who was canonized by his church and is the patron saint of converts studying church rites. In court Thursday, Patricia Steven told the judge she spells her middle name “the Catholic way.”

Got a tip on the tax scandal? Call Bill Myers at 202-459-4956 or e-mail bmyers@dcexaminer.com