Eighth Circuit -- United States v. William Jones, Jr.

Tax -- Repetitive and coordinated scheme to defraud IRS suffices for sophisticated means sentencing bump.

United States  v.  William Jones, Jr.

Fifth Circuit:" Pilgrim's Pride Corporation v. CIR

Tax.

Company's abandoned securities do not have to be accounted as Capital Losses.  The relevant statute refers to derivative obligations and claims relating to the capital asset, not the actual ownership of the asset.

Pilgrim's Pride Corporation v. CIR

Ninth Circuit -- MICHAEL SCHWAB V. CIR

Tax -- cash surrender value (including charges) rather than market value should be used to tax life insurance disbursements after early termination of policy.

MICHAEL SCHWAB V. CIR

Sixth Circuit -- Mark Kerman v. CIR

Tax -- no substance to the shelter, so the penalty for understating assets applies.  Circuit split on this noted.

Mark Kerman v. CIR 

Ninth Circuit -- PETER KNAPPE V. USA

Executor's reliance on accountant's advice as to tax deadline does not excuse the late filing -- deadlines are not a substantive matter.

PETER KNAPPE V. USA

Sixth Circuit -- Sarunas Abraitis v. USA

Tax -- although the administrative exhaustion requirement is not jurisdictional, claim is waived for not being raised in District Court, and because this particular deadline is not subject to equitable tolling.

Sarunas Abraitis v. USA 

Second Circuit -- City Wide Transit, Inc. v. Comm’r

Tax.

City Wide Transit, Inc. v. Comm’r

Third Circuit -- Neal Crispin v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

No clear error in Tax Court holding that a loan had no economic substance, as the deft never attempted to collect the proceeds and court findings on general credibility.

Penalty properly applied, as underreporting resulted from said insubstantiality.

Reliance on official opinion of no avail given the broad caveats in the opinion.

Neal Crispin v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

Seventh Circuit -- Matthew Thomas v. UBS AG

Dismissal of class action prior to certification -- Poz: Swiss bank had no obligation to tell folks that they had to pay relevant US taxes.

Matthew Thomas v. UBS AG

Second Circuit -- Alphonso v. C.I.R.

As use of the common grounds is allowed to co-op residents as part of their leasehold, they have sufficient property interest to present an issue of material fact as to whether a tax deduction for damage to the property was properly denied.

Alphonso v. C.I.R.

First Circuit -- Shafmaster v. US

Tax --

The IRS cannot be equitably estopped on the basis of a preliminary settlement.  In this case.

Notice and demand was sufficient under the statute.

Shafmaster v. US 

First Circuit -- RTR Technologies, Inc. v. Helming

Liability for bad tax advice, attorneys' fees for the suit.

RTR Technologies, Inc. v. Helming 

Ninth Circuit -- KAREN WILSON V. CIR

Tax Court can review evidence outside the record.

Dissent - Nope, as it's an APA review.

KAREN WILSON V. CIR

Federal Circuit -- ROAD AND HIGHWAY BUILDERS V. U.S.

Where the IRS acquires funds based on a claim later determined to be spurious, no recovery if no evidence of bad intent.

ROAD AND HIGHWAY BUILDERS V. U.S.

Ninth Circuit -- METRO ONE TELECOMMUNICATIONS, V. CIR

Net operating losses can't be applied to previous years' taxes.

Legislative intent, plain meaning.

METRO ONE TELECOMMUNICATIONS, V. CIR

Tenth Circuit -- United States v. Farr

No error in admission of prior bad acts.

Sufficient evidence for tax charge.

No error in the IRS' seking of civil rather than criminal penalties.

Law of Case doctrine bars Double Jeopardy claim.

United States v. Farr

First Circuit -- US v. Powers

Evidence that attorney knew of the situation is insufficient on its own to justify an advice-of-counsel instruction where the lawyer doesn't testify.

IRS agents can testify as to ultimate decisions of the factfinder when it's about tax matters.

Trial court imposed reasonable limits to keep other witnesses from giving opinions as to ultimate matters.

Trial court appropriately limited debate on question of document's admission.

US v. Powers

DC Circuit -- Judicial Watch, Inc. v. SSA

As the employer is considered a taxpayer, FOIA request for list of employers with the greatest number of SSN mismatches was properly denied under Exemption 3.

Judicial Watch, Inc. v. SSA

Seventh Circuit -- USA v. Dewayne Preacely

Trial court did not rr in finding violation of supervised release, given deft's involvement in tax preparation industry.

Vagueness of statute must be asserted on direct appeal or collateral attack, not revocation hearing.

Within guidelines sentence reasonable.

USA v. Dewayne Preacely

Second Circuit -- United States v. Coplan

Klein conspiracy is a well-settled question - Scotus & circuit precedent endorsed.  No a common-law crime, but creature of the statute.

Insufficient evidence for conspiracy -- possibly just good faith tax prep.

Knowing joinder of conspiracy needed for Pinkerton culpability.

Much dicussion of sufficiency of the evidence for different counts of conspiracy.

As deft was trying to mislead IRS agents in SDNY, materiality requirement in statute means that venue is proper in SDNY.

Admission of statements by unindicted party sufficiently probative, as finder o fact could have decided that it was reasonable to think that the statements at issue found their way to the conspirators.

Admission of co-conspirator statements does not require formal finding of a conspiracy for each statement or conspirator.

No abuse of discretion in barring deposition transcript under hearsay when introduced for the purpose of proving general truthfulness during the deposition.

Prosc. referrencing matter in opening means that its not a new issue in rebuttals.

Given data known by deft, conscious avoidance instruction was appropriate.

District Court erred in imposing fine over statutory maximum.  Other sentencing not unreasonable.

United States v. Coplan