By ERIC TUCKER
Associated Press

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear reality-show contestant Richard Hatch's appeal of his conviction for failing to pay taxes on the $1 million prize he won on the debut season of "Survivor."

Hatch, 47, was sentenced to four years and three months in prison after his 2006 conviction for tax evasion in federal court in Providence. He is scheduled to be released in October 2009.

Hatch's appeal already had been denied by a federal appeals court in Boston and was among more than a thousand rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court two weeks ago. The court, which takes up only a small number of the appeals it receives, did not explain its decision.

"He's disappointed with the decision," Hatch's attorney, Michael Minns, said Wednesday. "He's been worried about his family and taking care of them the entire time."

Hatch, of Newport, R.I., argued in his appeal that a judge improperly barred him from raising allegations of cheating during taping of the hit CBS show and from explaining why he believed the producers would pay his taxes for him.

During the trial, Minns told U.S. District Judge Hon. Ernest Torres outside the jury's presence that Hatch had caught show employees smuggling food to other contestants during taping in Borneo in 2000. He said a producer promised him his taxes would be paid if he kept quiet and went on to win the competition, a claim CBS has strongly denied.

Minns said Torres should have allowed Hatch to raise the cheating allegations. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which rejected Hatch's appeal in February, said Hatch was given ample opportunity by the judge to explain why he thought his taxes would be taken care of, but never presented any evidence to back up the claim of a quid-pro-quo arrangement.

Minns also argued the judge unfairly limited his cross-examination of the tax accountant who prepared Hatch's tax returns and who was a key witness for the government.

Besides his "Survivor" winnings, Hatch also was convicted of evading taxes on $327,000 he earned as co-host of a Boston radio show and $28,000 in rent on property he owned.

He was acquitted of seven bank-, mail- and wire-fraud charges that related to his charity, Horizon Bound, an outdoors program he planned to open for troubled youth.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's office in Rhode Island, which prosecuted Hatch, did not immediately comment.