The founder of the company that created the raunchy “Girls Gone Wild” videos has been indicted on US tax evasion charges after he channelled millions through a Bermuda bank account.

Joe Francis, 34, was charged by a federal grand jury in Reno, Nevada, of deducting more than $20 million in false business expenses on corporate income tax returns filed in 2002 and 2003.

Mr. Francis has made a fortune out of selling risque videos that feature scantily clad young women cavorting at parties, usually at nightclubs.

The indictment document alleges that Mr. Francis’s companies Mantra Films Inc. and Sands Media Inc. used offshore companies and nominee bank accounts — including one at the Bermuda Commercial Bank — to conceal some of that income.

It shows that more than $15 million was moved from the BCB account to a brokerage account in Irvine, California during 2002 and 2003.

The document states that Mr. Francis set up a Cayman Islands company called Rothwell Ltd., which in November 2001 set up an account at BCB. It is alleged that Mr. Francis used “nominee signatories to conceal his beneficial ownership of this bank account”.

Phoney expenses alleged included $10.4 million in “false consulting services”, $3.78 million listed as business expenses but used to build a home in Punta Mita, Mexico, and $500,000 in false insurance expenses.

If convicted of the federal charges, he faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and fines of up to $500,000.

Mr. Francis is facing other legal problems simultaneously. He was arrested by federal marshals on Tuesday in a contempt of court citation stemming from a civil case in Florida, where he is being held without bail.

That lawsuit was brought against him by seven underage women who were filmed by “Girls Gone Wild” cameramen in Florida in 2003. The contempt citation was issued after Francis rebuffed a judge’s order to settle the case with the aid of a mediator.

No-one at the BCB was available to comment by press time yesterday.