A former banker agreed to become a key government witness in the District’s largest public corruption case after pleading guilty Wednesday to helping launder nearly $18 million stolen from the D.C. tax office.

Walter Jones, 33, a former Bank of America official, became the third person this month to admit guilt in the tax office fraud case. He confessed in federal court that he helped alleged tax scam mastermind Harriette Walters siphon off tens of millions of public dollars through a series of phony property tax refunds.

Under Wednesday’s plea, Jones has also agreed to cooperate. A top source close to the investigation described Jones as a key player in the scandal because he helped launder a significant chunk of the stolen money.

Bank of America officials released a terse statement saying that Jones “no longer works for the bank and we are cooperating with authorities.”

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The tax scandal was made public last year when officials swooped in on Walters, tax office employee Diane Gustus and nearly a dozen others and charged with them with ripping off the public to subsidize top-shelf lifestyles that included lavish trips to casinos, ritzy cars and gaudy baubles.

Wednesday’s plea agreement is the most extensive accounting to date of what prosecutors said is stolen money. Government lawyers laid out dozens of checks, made out to bogus companies. Jones helped Walters funnel the checks dating to 2000 through bank accounts, officials said.

According to authorities, the pair met in the mid-1990s, as Walters was escalating her scam. Around the time Walters met Jones, authorities have told The Examiner, six-figure checks began flowing out the office. By the time Walters was arrested, almost every six-figure check coming out of the city’s property tax office was phony, an Examiner analysis showed.

In court papers, authorities charged that Jones took about $366,000 in checks as his cut from the scam.

bmyers@dcexaminer.com

smccabe@dcexaminer.com