Summary Opinions is very late this week due to my various day jobs and the shoveling of snow. We covered a few big items last week, and here are a few others that we thought deserved a few words.
read more...- First, United States v. Clarke was granted cert by SCOTUS to determine if taxpayers have a right to a hearing when a taxpayer alleges a summons was issued for an improper purpose. We’ve mentioned this case a few times, and are glad this will be reviewed. The incomparable Jack Townsend covered this issue very well on his Federal Tax Procedure Blog back in December.
- Jack Townsend also covered another Clark case this week, where the Court of Federal Claims held the taxpayer failed to show full payment under Flora, so it lacked jurisdiction. What makes it interesting is that the Court transferred the case to the Tax Court for prepayment review, because the taxpayer had filed within the ninety days allowing for Tax Court review. Not something you see every day.
- The Tax Court had a holding regarding captive insurance companies – something that is actively discussed a lot lately by planners and I had heard was under heavier audit review lately. In Rent A Center, Inc. v. Comm’r, the Tax Court held that the wholly owned captive life insurance company of the parent, Rent A Center, was not a sham and was created for non-tax reasons. There are lengthy discussions regarding the funding levels and the insurable risks in the case.
- I found this link through Joe Kristan’s Roth & Co. blog, which is the Tax Foundations advice to same sex couples this tax filing season. The post includes a link to how each state is handling the issue.
- Mr. Beanie Baby gets probation. Damn. Money can’t buy you happiness…but he is probably happy all that money bought his way out of jail time for that $100 million plus hidden offshore account. Last fall, Villanova hosted the 2013 Norman J. Shachovy Symposium, reviewing pressing issues in US Tax Administration. The third panel that day discussed criminal sentencing guidelines, specifically the fairness of them and the deterrent value. You can hear the panel discussion at the above link, where the panel does somewhat discuss how wealth can impact sentencing. I suspect a future panel on this topic would include this case.
- Here is a brief article from Bryan Cave, LLP about the United States v. Doe holding from the Fifth Amendment that we touched on before in SumOp. Doe dealt with a taxpayer claiming Fifth Amendment privilege on a subpoena for foreign bank records, with the Court holding the required records doctrine trumped the privilege.
- Here is a post from IRS Medic discussing the IRS Offer in Compromise Pre-Qualifier calculator. As Anthony Parent points out, the calculator can have interesting (taxpayer friendly) results, but that is not binding on the Service. Mr. Parent doesn’t seem to like the calculator much (“the IRS Offer in Compromise Pre-Qualifier is a dumb calculator”). I like the idea behind the calculator, but haven’t used it yet, so cannot offer my own thoughts.
- Here is a post about whether or not you have to pay your employees on snow days. Not exactly tax procedure related (there would be withholdings), but the snow is horizontal out my window, and I think the post was written by another Villanova alum. Villanova needs some good press after the blowout loss to Creighton last night. Thankfully, Procedurally Taxing covers tax procedure significantly better than Villanova’s basketball team covers the three.
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