Menu
Tax Notes logo

The Intersection of Foreclosure and Innocent Spouse

Posted on Nov. 20, 2018

In United States v. Charles LeBeau, No. 3:17-cv-01046 (S.D. Cal. Oct. 16, 2018) the district court stayed a foreclosure action brought by the IRS to allow the taxpayer’s wife to pursue her innocent spouse claim. Because the innocent spouse claim has a ways to go from a procedural perspective, it may be some time before the foreclosure case starts back up. The case provides an interesting look at the intersection of foreclosure and innocent spouse and deserves some discussion.

Victoria and Charles LeBeau were married at some point prior to 1980. They remain married though they are now legally separated. While the separation is legal, they continue to reside in the same house in La Jolla, California. For anyone not familiar with La Jolla, it generally has very nice houses near the ocean just north of San Diego. I will leave it to Bob Kamman to fill in the rest of the story on the value and location of the house. I am sure that Bob will find some interesting facts here that the opinion does not contain and that I am not tracking down. Keep a lookout in the comment section.

They bought the house in 1980 as joint tenants; however, they deeded the house to Victoria for no consideration in 1987. In 1988 Victoria transferred the property back to both of them for no consideration. Five days later they executed a deed of trust in favor of Security Allied Services to secure a loan of just over $300,000. In August of 1989, the couple transferred the property solely to Victoria again for no consideration. Charles created an entity known as Casa de Erin, LLC which the court describes as the alter ego/nominee of Charles and/or Victoria and in 2003 Victoria transferred the property to Casa de Erin for no consideration. In 2006 Casa de Erin rescinded the deed and transferred the property back to Victoria for no consideration and she remains the property’s nominal owner. The court notes that “upon information and belief, Charles LeBeau has continued to reside at the Property and has retained all the benefits and burdens of ownership.”

The IRS has already reduced its assessments to judgment and this case seeks to foreclose its lien on the property.

Given the recitation of facts in this case, I would not place a high value on Victoria’s chances of achieving innocent spouse status. If she was actively engaged in all of these transfers, innocence is not the word that comes to mind. In fact, the IRS denied her request for relief for many years though it did apparently grant her partial, but significant ($193,272) relief for 1995. She filed a petition with the Tax Court seeking review of the denial of relief on June 22, 2018. Charles has intervened in her Tax Court case presumably to argue that she should not be relieved of liability. (This is one of those cases where it might be really interesting to follow the pleadings if it did not require a trip to DC to the clerk’s office and 50 cents per page.) She asks that the district court stay the foreclosure of what I am presuming is a very nice place where they live and engage in deed swapping at a prodigious pace.

In the discussion section of the opinion the court first says that “the district court has no jurisdiction to decide an innocent spouse claim” citing to United States v. Boynton, 2007 WL 737725 (S.D. Cal. 2007) and Andrews v. United States, 69 F.Supp. 2d 972 (N.D. Ohio 1999). I do not necessarily agree with the court on this issue as discussed in the post in the Chandler case; however, the DOJ Trial Section attorney would have had difficulty arguing the opposite side of that issue.

The court next notes that it has broad discretion to stay proceedings noting that it must consider:

  • the possible damage which may result from the granting of a stay, (2) the hardship or inequity which a party may suffer in being required to go forward, and (3) the orderly course of justice measured in terms of the simplifying or complicating of issues, proof, and questions of law which could be expected to result from a stay.

The defendants made the following arguments in support of a stay:

On the third factor, Defendants seek a stay pending resolution of the issues of “fraudulent transfers” and “nominee theory of ownership” now before the U.S. Tax Court arguing that Court lacks jurisdiction to consider these issues and a stay would avoid inconsistent rulings. On the second factor, they argue that a stay would cause hardship by being required to pursue litigation in two different courts. Lastly, on the first factor, Defendants content that a stay would not prejudice the government.

The court cites the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Rodgers, 461 U.S. 677 (1983) regarding its discretion to foreclose a federal tax lien on taxpayer’s property. We have discussed Rodgers before here in a case blogged by Les with some similarities to the LeBeau’s situation. After discussing the general Rodgers factors a court should weigh in deciding whether to permit foreclosure, the district court here cites to two prior cases in which someone claiming innocent spouse status sought to use that status as a basis for postponing foreclosure based on the Rodgers’ factors. In the first case, United States v. Battersby, 390 F. Supp. 2d 865 (N.D. Ohio 2005) the court did stay the action while in the second case, United States v. McGrew, 2014 WL 7877053 (C.D. Cal. 2014), aff’d, 669 Fed. App’x 831 (9th Cir. 2016) the court concluded Rodgers was inapplicable stating that “innocent spouse protection does not entitle [non-liable spouse] to prevent foreclosure on the Government’s tax liens.”

A third case exists out of South Carolina, which the LeBeau court does not mention, in which Carl Smith and Joe DiRizzo sought to assist the wife in her effort to stop foreclosure and seek innocent spouse relief, United States v. Dew. The IRS brought a foreclosure proceeding to sell some jointly owned property for liabilities of both Mr. and Mrs. Dew.  Late during the proceeding, Mrs. Dew filed a Form 8857, which had not yet been ruled on by the IRS.  The DOJ first asked the district court to ignore this belated filing.  And the court essentially did so in 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 112979 (D. S.C. 2015), where it wrote in footnote 1:

The Court notes that Mrs. Dew filed objections asserting an “innocent spouse” defense pursuant to 26 U.S.C. § 6015(f). Even assuming such a claim can properly be raised for the first time in the objections, the innocent spouse defense cannot be considered by this Court because it lies within the exclusive jurisdiction of the tax court. See Jones v. C.I.R., 642 F.3d 459, 461 (4th Cir. 2011) (noting that § 6015(f) authorizes the “Secretary of the Treasury” to grant an innocent spouse relief; see also United States v. Elman, No. 10 CV 6369, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 173026, 2012 WL 6055782, at *4 (N.D. Ill. Dec. 6, 2012) (stating that “exclusive jurisdiction over [the defendant’s] innocent spouse defense under § 6015(f) lies with the Tax Court.”).

The Dews filed an appeal to the 4th Circuit arguing that the collection suit could not go forward.  Section 6015(e)(1)(B)(i) provides:

Except as otherwise provided in section 6851 or 6861 [26 USCS § 6851 or 6861], no levy or proceeding in court shall be made, begun, or prosecuted against the individual making an election under subsection (b) or (c) or requesting equitable relief under subsection (f) for collection of any assessment to which such election or request relates until the close of the 90-day period referred to in subparagraph (A)(ii), or, if a petition has been filed with the Tax Court, until the decision of the Tax Court has become final.

Mrs. Dew filed a response with the District Court arguing that 6015(e)(1)(B) was mandatory and asked, therefore, that foreclosure be stayed.  In response to this filing, the government finally agreed that it could not pursue collection against her for the taxes subject to the Form 8857, but still asked the court to foreclose and sell the property to satisfy Mr. Dew’s tax debts and Mrs. Dew’s tax debts that were not covered by the Form 8857.  See attached response. The court went ahead with the sale and instructed the distribution of proceeds in accordance with the government’s revised listing (excluding the Form 8857 liabilities). See the final revised order confirming the sale here.  The 4th Cir. then decided the appeal and held against the Dews.  670 Fed. Appx. 170 (4th Cir. 2016).  The entire text of the 4th Cir. opinion is as follows:

James and Veronica Dew (Appellants) appeal the district court’s order and judgment granting the United States’ motion for summary judgment in the United States’ action seeking to reduce to judgment Appellants’ federal income tax liabilities, and to foreclose the federal tax liens securing those liabilities on Appellants’ jointly owned real property. We have reviewed the record and have considered the parties’ arguments and discern no reversible error. Accordingly, we grant James Dew’s application to proceed in forma pauperis and affirm the district court’s amended judgment. United States v. Dew, No. 4:14-cv-00166-TLW (D.S.C. May 19, 2016). We dispense with oral argument because the facts [**2] and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

In the Lebeau’s case the district court determined that the foreclosure case should be stayed against the LeBeaus until the end of the innocent spouse case. I do not find this result satisfying. Even if the Tax Court finds Victoria innocent, the IRS can still foreclose on the house and sell it subject to her interest. The decision would be much more satisfying if the court had explained why the Rodgers factors might weigh against allowing foreclosure to go forward. Was there something special about Victoria’s need for the house or even Charles’ need? I am assuming that they are not young at this point since they bought the house almost 40 years ago. Absent something special, I would allow the sale to go forward and hold her half in escrow. Since the innocent spouse determination does not prevent the sale, it does not seem that, by itself, it should hold up the sale.

It is possible that I am also someone jaundiced about her innocence given all of the transfers of the property recounted by the court but I recognize that there could be facts that would support a finding of innocent spouse status not brought out in this opinion. The significant delay that the court has provided here does prejudice the IRS unless one assumes that the property will continue to go up in value and that delay will ultimately benefit the IRS in that fashion.

DOCUMENT ATTRIBUTES
Copy RID