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Prison Mailbox Rule Doesn’t Apply to Refund Claims

Posted on Oct. 2, 2019

In what the court thinks is apparently a case of first impression, a district court has held that a refund claim that arrived at the IRS more than three years after it was due is not timely under the “prison mailbox rule”.  Whitaker v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 165345 (N.D. Fla. 9/26/19), adopting magistrate’s opinion at 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 166975.  The court also holds (following precedent in the Fifth Circuit which a court in the Eleventh Circuit had to follow) that the common law mailbox rule cannot apply because it has been superseded by section 7502.  Circuits are split as to the latter holding. Further, the court holds that the taxpayer did not make out a factual case for equitable estoppel to apply to the IRS.

Facts

During 2012, the taxpayer, a single individual, performed some work for which he was eventually sent a Form W-2. But he did not timely file a return for 2012 until sometime in 2016.

The taxpayer says he filed an original Form 1040-EZ before he got a copy of the Form W-2. The original return showed no tax liability for the year, but sought refund of (1) $446 that the taxpayer claimed had been withheld as income taxes from his wages and (2) an EITC of $475. The taxpayer was incarcerated in 2016 and claims that he handed his original 2012 return to prison authorities for mailing on March 25, 2016 – within the 3-year lookback period of section 6511(b). (Since it was an original return containing a claim, the return would have been timely under the 3-year look-forward rule of section 6511(a), so the issue is whether the 3-year lookback rule of section 6511(b) regarding the amount of taxes paid has been satisfied.)

The taxpayer says that in late April 2016, he first obtained a copy of the Form W-2 for 2012 and only then learned that no income tax withholding had been done on his wages. He prepared an amended return, therefore, removing the portion of the prior claim for withheld income taxes. The amended return still sought an EITC refund of $475. The taxpayer handed this amended return to prison authorities for mailing on April 21, 2016.

The IRS says that it never received the original return, but on April 30, 2016, it received the amended return and filed it as of that date. The IRS denied the claim as untimely.

The taxpayer brought suit on the $475 refund claim in the district court for the Northern District of Florida. The DOJ moved for summary judgment that the amount of the claim was limited under section 6511(b) to $0. The taxpayer cross-moved for summary judgment, arguing that the claim should be deemed filed on March 25, 2016. The taxpayer supported his motion with an unsigned note purportedly from “Classification Counselor Mrs. Doll.” In that unsigned note, Mrs. Doll stated that “[o]n 3/25/16 Mailroom Staff Ms. Bailey sealed, timestamped and post-dated the 2012 tax return. This is logged in the legal/privileged mail log.”  The taxpayer also submitted a copy of his original return, his amended return, and affidavits of inmates who helped or observed him preparing his 2012 tax return. The taxpayer did not, however, submit the envelope in which the original return was mailed or any proof of its mailing by registered or certified mail.

Holdings

The magistrate’s opinion that was later adopted by the district court judge begins by taking the position that a timely-filed refund claim is necessary to the district court’s jurisdiction, citing United States v. Dalm, 494 U.S. 596, 609 (1990). As an aside, Keith and I have been arguing recently that Dalm is no longer good law on these points – that under more recent Supreme Court case law, both the filing of an administrative claim (required by section 7422(a)) and its timely filing (required by section 6511(a)) are merely mandatory claims processing rules not going to the court’s jurisdiction. See Gillespie v. United States, 670 Fed. Appx. 393, 395 (7th Cir. 2016) (not deciding issue, but noting that current Supreme Court case law on the distinction between subject matter jurisdiction and mere claims processing rules “may cast doubt on the line of cases suggesting that § 7422(a) is jurisdictional”, including Dalm.).

Without discussion, the magistrate’s opinion then mentions the further tax amount paid look-back requirements of section 6511(b) and overall treats compliance with that subsection as a nonjurisdictional matter. As another aside, most courts today, without noting it, still treat compliance with section 6511(b) as a jurisdictional matter. However, the Federal Circuit has held that the issue of how much tax was paid during the lookback period of section 6511(b) is not jurisdictional. See Boeri v. United States, 724 F.3d 1367, 1369 (Fed. Cir. 2013), on which Stephen blogged here. So, the magistrate in Whitaker unknowingly aligns himself with the Federal Circuit. By moving for summary judgment, the parties also seem to align with the Federal Circuit, since, if compliance with section 6511(b) is jurisdictional, the DOJ should, instead, have moved to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction under FRCP 12(b)(1). It is odd, though, that sometimes in the opinion, the magistrate seems to equate compliance with section 6511(b)’s payment rules as also jurisdictional, but yet grants the DOJ summary judgment that he refund is limited to $0 – a merits holding.

Third, in applying the lookback rules of section 6511(b), the court is supposed to look at how much tax was “paid” in the 3-year period before the claim was filed. The statute limits the refund to those taxes paid within the lookback period. But, Whitaker’s claim is now solely predicated on the EITC, which, of course, he never actually “paid”. Over a decade ago, while the director of the tax clinic of the University of Connecticut, now-Tax-Court-Special-Trial-Judge Leyden argued to the Second Circuit that there is no time limitation under section 6511(b) on EITC claims because they were never “paid” by the taxpayer. In Israel v. United States, 356 F.3d 221, 225 (2d Cir. 2004), the court held that the EITC should be treated as “deemed paid” by the taxpayer on the April 15 following the end of the tax year, just like withholding and estimated taxes under section 6513(b)(1) and (2) are treated as paid on that date. The magistrate in Whitaker cites and applies Israel. Thus, he deems the EITC “paid” on April 15, 2013, so the amount of the claim allowable is limited to $0 if the claim was filed after April 15, 2016. Aside: I wonder why no one has ever litigated the Israel issue in any other Circuit? As I see it, the Israel opinion’s reasoning is something like “ipse dixit”.

The magistrate in Whitaker then notes that section 7502(a) provides a timely-mailing-is-timely-filing rule for, among other things, refund claims. But, that rule doesn’t benefit Whitaker, since it only extends the filing date when there is a postmark on the envelope that shows the envelope was mailed on or before the last date to file. There is no envelope in the record, let alone one bearing such a postmark. The court also notes the special rule under section 7502(c) that could deem evidence of the date of mailing by registered or certified mail as the date of the postmark under subsection (a), but there is also no evidence in the record as to registered or certified mailing of an envelope.

Next, the magistrate considers the possibility that the common law mailbox rule (allowing for parol and other extrinsic evidence of mailing) has not been eliminated by section 7502 or the regulations thereunder. The court notes the existing split among the Circuits about whether the common law mailbox rule survived the enactment of section 7502 and the recent ruling of the Ninth Circuit in Baldwin v. United States, 921 F.3d 836 (9th Cir. 2019), that regulations under section 7502 have abrogated all case law holding that the common law mailbox rule still survives the enactment of section 7502. We blogged on Baldwin and that case law split here. As an aside (boy, am I abusing the privilege of asides), the Baldwins filed a petition for certiorari on September 23, 2019 at Supreme Court Docket No. 19-402, a copy of which can be found here. In the petition, they argue that the Court should revisit the correctness of its opinion in National Cable & Telecomms. Assn. v. Band X Internet Services, 545 U.S. 967 (2005), where it held that regulations may overrule preexisting case law where the case law was not predicated on the court holding the statute’s language unambiguous. In the alternative, the petition argues for Brand X to be limited so as not to permit regulations that overrule common law case law like the mailbox rule.

The district court in Whitaker is located in the Eleventh Circuit, which has not taken a precedential position regarding the continued existence of the common law mailbox rule since the passage of section 7502 or the enactment of the regulations thereunder. However, the magistrate notes that the Fifth Circuit in Drake v. Commissioner, 554 F.2d 736, 738-39 (5th Cir. 1977), held the common law mailbox rule to no longer exist after section 7502. Since that opinion was issued before the Eleventh Circuit was carved out of the Fifth Circuit in 1981, Drake is thus binding precedent on district courts in the Eleventh Circuit under Bonner v. City of Prichard, 661 F.2d 1206, 1209-10 (11th Cir. 1981), and the common law mailbox rule proof offered by Whitaker can be of no use to him.

Next, and most novel, the magistrate considers whether the “prison mailbox rule” applies to assist Whitaker. The court apparently finds no case law on whether the prison mailbox rule can apply to tax refund claims. In the following passage, the magistrate declines to extend the prison mailbox rule to tax refund claims:

The Supreme Court created the prison mailbox rule when it held that — for purposes of Rule 4(a)(1) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure — a notice of appeal that a pro se prisoner sought to file in a federal court of appeals should be considered filed on the date the prisoner delivered it “to the prison authorities for forwarding to the court clerk.” Houston v. Lack, 487 U.S. 266, 275, 108 S. Ct. 2379, 2385 (1988); Daker v. Comm’r, Ga. Dep’t of Corrs., 820 F.3d 1278, 1286 (11th Cir. 2016). In reaching its decision, the Court reasoned that the word “filed” was ambiguous insofar as neither Rule 4(a)(1) nor the applicable statute set “forth criteria for determining the moment at which . . . ‘filing’ has occurred.” Houston at 272-76, 108 S. Ct. 2383-85; Bonilla v. United States Dep’t of Justice, 535 F. App’x 891, 893 (11th Cir. 2013). Additionally, in creating the prison mailbox rule, the Supreme Court never stated that the rule applies to every document a prisoner seeks to mail. Rather, the rule announced by the Supreme Court applied only to notices of appeal submitted to federal courts of appeals, and was subsequently codified consistent with that limitation. See Fed. R. App. P. 4(c).


Other courts expanded the rule announced in Houston v. Lack to apply the prison mailbox rule to other court filings. See Edwards v. United States, 266 F.3d 756, 758 (7th Cir. 2001) (per curiam) (noting that courts expanded the prison mailbox rule to include many other types of court filings). This expansion was codified to apply to appellate documents and habeas petitions filed with federal courts. See Fed. R. App. P. 25(a)(2)(A)(iii); Fed. R. Bankr. P. 8002(c); Rules Governing Section 2254 Proceedings For the United States District Courts, Rule 3(d); Rules Governing Section 2255 Proceedings For the United States District Courts, Rule 3(d).
Consistent with its historical roots, in the Eleventh Circuit, the prison mailbox rule is limited to filings made to courts. See Williams v. McNeil, 557 F.3d 1287, 1290 n.2 (11th Cir. 2009) (“Under the ‘prison mailbox rule,’ a pro se prisoner’s court filing is deemed filed on the date it is delivered to prison authorities for mailing.”) (emphasis added); Garvey v. Vaughn, 993 F.2d 776, 783 (11th Cir. 1993) (holding that the prison mailbox rule announced in Houston applies to pro se prisoners seeking to file in federal courts complaints under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Federal Tort Claims Act) (emphasis added). Plaintiff has not cited any authority demonstrating that the prison mailbox rule applies to tax returns submitted to prison officials for mailing to the IRS.


Furthermore, the Supreme Court’s holding in Fex v. Michigan strongly suggests that the prison mailbox rule does not apply generally to all documents a prisoner seeks to mail to government entities. 507 U.S. 43, 47, 113 S. Ct. 1085, 1089 (1993). In that case, the prisoner sought to apply the prison mailbox rule to a request for disposition under the Interstate Agreement on Detainers that he had provided to prison officials to mail. Fex, 507 U.S. at 46, 113 S. Ct. at 1088. In determining the date the document was “caused to be delivered,” the Supreme Court did not apply the prison mailbox rule and instead held that the document was “caused to be delivered” on the date the prosecutor’s office and court received the request, and not on the date the inmate gave the request to prison officials for mailing. Fex, 507 U.S. at 47, 113 S. Ct. at 1089.


Other courts have noted that “the prison mailbox rule does not apply when there is a ‘specific statutory or regulatory regime’ governing the filing at issue.” Crook v. Comm’r of Internal Revenue Serv., 173 F. App’x 653, 656 (10th Cir. 2006) (quoting Longenette v. Krusing, 322 F.3d 758, 763 (3d Cir. 2003)); Smith v. Conner, 250 F.3d 277, 277, 279 (5th Cir. 2001); Nigro v. Sullivan, 40 F.3d 990, 994-95 (9th Cir. 1994). More specifically, when the particular statute defines the term “filing” or “filed” — as § 7502 essentially does — courts have seen no reason to usurp a statutory or regulatory definition by resorting to the prison mailbox rule. See Crook, 173 F. App’x at 656 (interpreting the word “filed” defined in Section 7502(a)(1) of the Internal Revenue Code); Smith, 250 F.3d at 279 (holding that the court “shall resort to Houston if the rule does not clearly define filing” and in all other cases the court “will enforce the regulations as written”); Nigro, 40 F.3d at 994 (noting that the prison-mailbox rule did not apply because the administrative regulations defined the word “filed” as “when the receipt is issued.”). [Emphasis in original.]

Finally, Whitaker had argued that the government should be estopped from arguing for the section 6511(b) limitation in this case. It is well-settled that jurisdictional conditions are not subject to estoppel (just like they are not subject to waiver, forfeiture or equitable tolling). Dolan v. United States, 560 U.S. 605, 610 (2010). Since the magistrate appears not to treat section 6511(b) compliance as jurisdictional, this presents him with the question of whether estoppel could apply to the assertion that section 6511(b)’s conditions were not met. The magistrate states:

Plaintiff asserts that Defendant should be estopped from invoking § 6511’s three-year deadline because the IRS sent him a disallowance letter — dated and sent to Plaintiff on May 5, 2017 — in which the IRS incorrectly stated that May 15, 2016, was Plaintiff’s (already expired) deadline to file his claim for 2012 taxes. (Doc. 56-13 at 2). Plaintiff intimates that he relied on this letter (Doc. 56-13), even though the IRS issued this letter on May 5, 2017, more than a year after the deadline to file his return had expired (April 15, 2016), and long after the date Plaintiff claims that he sent his initial 2012 tax return to the IRS (March 25, 2016).


“The question of whether equitable estoppel is ever available against the federal government is unresolved,” but it is clear that the party asserting estoppel against the government has a heavy burden. Ferry v. Hayden, 954 F.2d 658, 661 (11th Cir. 1992) (citing Heckler v. Cmty. Health Servs., 467 U.S. 51, 61, 104 S. Ct. 2218, 2224 (1984)). [footnote and some citations omitted; emphasis in original]

The magistrate does not decide whether estoppel could ever apply to section 6511, but details exhaustively why the facts alleged by Whitaker could not give rise to estoppel in any event.

Observations

I wonder if Whitaker will appeal his loss to the Eleventh Circuit? The case only involves $475 plus interest from March or April of 2016 to date.

Whitaker proceeded pro se in the district court and got the district court $350 filing fee put on an installment agreement so he could proceed in forma pauperis. He is obligated to pay 20% of his income out of his “inmate account” towards the full $350 fee, over time. He has so far paid $139.66 towards the fee.  Could he get the $505 appellate filing fee waived?

Does anyone admitted to the Eleventh Circuit want to represent him? (He appears to be quite the prison litigator, having filed numerous papers in the district court citing case law.) In his motion for summary judgment, he argued for the application of the common law mailbox rule and estoppel. In order for him to prevail in the Eleventh Circuit on the mailbox rule, he would need an en banc panel that decided to no longer follow the Fifth Circuit’s controlling Drake opinion holding that the common law mailbox rule has been supplanted by section 7502. That is pretty unlikely. And the Supreme Court in Baldwin is not being asked to resolve that Circuit split about the common law mailbox rule – merely to hold that the regulation under section 7502 doesn’t overrule any Circuit Court that has already held that the common law mailbox rule still applies after section 7502. So, a taxpayer victory in Baldwin won’t be enough help Whitaker.

Whitaker’s case might have been a good litigating vehicle for the Israel issue of whether the section 6511(b) limits apply at all to EITC claims. If section 6511(b) doesn’t apply, then all the issues decided by the magistrate on whether Whitaker mailed too late go by the wayside as irrelevant. But, I have read Whitaker’s motion for summary judgment, and he doesn’t argue that section 6511(b) doesn’t limit EITC claims. It appears he has waived that Israel issue. Too bad.

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