David J. Moise and Jill E. Misener

In less than six months, on January 1, 2018, the new centralized partnership audit rules enacted by Congress as part of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 (“BBA”) will go into effect. The new rules were drafted in response to the proliferation of business entities that are taxed as partnerships (such as LLCs), and the perceived difficulty in being able to both effectively audit these entities and to assess and collect tax from the individual parties as appropriate.

The BBA creates a new partnership audit regime that significantly changes the procedures for partnership audits under the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act (“TEFRA”) and the special rules for Electing Large Partnerships (“ELP”). Under the new rules, tax adjustments resulting from partnership examinations will generally be assessed at the partnership level rather than the individual partner level. This enables the IRS to collect tax due on partnership adjustments at the entity level, effectively imposing an entity level tax on partnerships. Previously, under TEFRA, adjustments to partnership items were determined in a single proceeding at the partnership level, but then flowed through to partners pursuant to a complex set of rules requiring significant IRS time and effort. The new rules are intended to simplify the complexity of the current partnership audit rules, and increase the ability of the IRS to examine partnerships, particularly large and tiered partnerships. Continue reading →

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At the ABA Section of Taxation’s 2017 May Meeting, Erick Martinez, the IRS Criminal Investigation Division’s Director of Field Operations – Northern Area, provided insight into the Division’s current priorities and strategies. Mr. Martinez indicated that the Division is concentrating on nationally coordinated investigations in conjunction with the Justice Department Tax Division and the IRS Large Business and International Division, such as cases involving renewable fuel credits.

The Criminal Investigation Division is also increasing its focus on data-driven cases such as beneficial owner cases, given the plethora of information resulting from the Swiss bank program and offshore voluntary disclosure programs. Mr. Martinez further noted an increased emphasis on cybercrime with two new cybercrime units in Los Angeles and Washington investigating failure to report income earned through the use of technology.

On December 22, 2016, the United States Tax Court (the “Court”) issued 15 West 17^th Street LLC v. Commissioner, 147 T.C. No. 19 (2016) and addressed, a question related to the statutory construction of section 170(f)(8),[1] which governs the substantiation requirements for certain charitable contributions. The Court held that the taxpayer was not entitled to a charitable contribution deduction for its donation of a historic preservation deed of easement to a non-profit organization on the ground that the rulemaking authority delegated in subparagraph (D) is not self-executing in the absence of regulations. Therefore, the general rule set forth in subparagraph (A) requiring a contemporaneous written acknowledgment applied to the gift at issue.   Continue reading →

Jed M. Silversmith and Jeffrey M. Rosenfeld

U.S. citizens who owe more than $50,000 in unpaid federal taxes are at substantial risk of having their U.S. passports revoked within the next few months. In December 2015, Congress enacted legislation requiring the IRS to provide a list of names to the State Department of individuals with “seriously delinquent tax debt.”¹ That term was defined in the statute to mean tax debt of over $50,000, including interest and penalties.  26 U.S.C. § 7345(b). The legislation also requires that the State Department refuse to issue new passports and gives the State Department discretion to revoke currently issued passports. See 22 U.S.C. § 2714A. Continue reading →

The Pennsylvania Department of Revenue has announced the details of its new tax amnesty program.  The program will run from April 21 to June 19,2017.  All taxes administered by the Department are eligible for amnesty.  Significant penalty and interest relief is available to all who participate, and taxpayers not known to the Department can avoid all taxes, penalties and interest for periods before 2010. Continue reading →

A new Pennsylvania tax amnesty program is coming. It was enacted as part of the state’s 2016–2017 budget process. Taxpayers with unfiled state tax returns or returns that need to be amended will be able to pay the tax and half of the interest they owe, with the balance of the interest and all penalties being forgiven. Depending on individual circumstances, there may be only a five-year look back with all prior year tax liabilities forgiven. The effective date has not yet been announced, but when it is there will be a 60-day window to take advantage of the program.

The Amnesty Program

Any tax administered by the Department of Revenue that is delinquent as of December 31, 2015, will be eligible for the tax amnesty program, which will go into effect for 60 consecutive days beginning on a date to be established by the Governor. Under the amnesty program, one-half of all interest and 100 percent of all penalties on eligible taxes that are delinquent as of December 31, 2015, will be waived for taxpayers who file tax amnesty returns and pay delinquent taxes and one-half the interest that is due within the amnesty period.

A taxpayer with “unknown” liabilities who participates in the program and complies with all of its requirements will not be liable for any taxes of the same type that were due prior to January 1, 2011. “Unknown” means that either no return has been filed, no payment has been made, and the taxpayer has not been contacted by the Revenue Department concerning the unfiled returns or unpaid tax, or if a return has been filed, the tax was underreported and the taxpayer has not been contacted by the Revenue Department concerning the underreported tax.

A taxpayer with liabilities known to the Revenue Department may participate in the amnesty program and get the benefit of the waiver of all penalties and half the interest, but must file or amend all unfiled or deficient tax returns.

A taxpayer under criminal investigation or that is the subject of a criminal complaint or a pending criminal action for an alleged violation of any law imposing an eligible tax may not participate. A taxpayer who participates in the program is not eligible to participate in any future amnesty program. Additionally, if within two years after the end of the program a taxpayer that is granted amnesty becomes delinquent for certain periods in payment of any taxes that are due or in the filing of any required returns, the Department of Revenue may assess and collect all penalties and interest waived through the amnesty program.

The Department of Revenue is expected to publish guidance on participation in the amnesty program by no later than mid-September. Until then, many of the details of the program will not be available. For more information please click here.

On June 2, 2016, the United States Tax Court issued 旋风加速器的官网在哪里 denying a Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Jurisdiction the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) filed on the ground that the taxpayer’s petition was not timely filed.[1] As these motions are typically granted or denied by the court through a simple order, it seemed strange that the court would issue a division opinion, which is generally reserved for cases involving an issue of first impression or an important legal issue or principle. The court, however, used this case as a means to change precedent related to the date on which a petition must be filed in Tax Court to be considered timely. Continue reading →

On July 21, 2016, the Ninth Circuit in United States v. Hom, No. 14-16214 D.C. No. 3:13-cv-03721-WHA (9th Cir. 2016), determined that a taxpayer who held an online poker account with PokerStars and PartyPoker was not required to report those accounts on a FinCEN Report 114, Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR).  The taxpayer, however, was required to report his FirePay account on an FBAR.

The Ninth Circuit overturned the decision of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, in part, which had held that all these three accounts were reportable on an FBAR.

The key issue was whether either PokerStars, PartyPoker or FirePay was a financial institution.

The Ninth Circuit stated that:

“[F]inancial institution” is in turn defined to include a number of specific types of businesses, including “a commercial bank,” “a private banker,” and “a licensed sender of money or any other person who engages as a business in the transmission of funds.” 31 U.S.C. § 5312(a)(2).

Hom’s FirePay account fits within the definition of a financial institution for purposes of FBAR filing requirements because FirePay is a money transmitter. See 31 U.S.C. § 5312(a)(2)(R); 31 C.F.R. § 103.11(uu)(5) (2006). FirePay acted as an intermediary between Hom’s Wells Fargo account and the online poker sites. Hom could carry a balance in his FirePay account, and he could transfer his FirePay funds to either his Wells Fargo account or his online poker accounts. It also appears that FirePay charged fees to transfer funds. As such, FirePay acted as “a licensed sender of money or any other person who engages as a business in the transmission of funds” under 31 U.S.C. § 5312(a)(2)(R) and therefore qualifies as a “financial institution.” See 31 C.F.R. § 103.11(uu)(5) (2006). Hom’s FirePay account is also “in a foreign country” because FirePay is located in and regulated by the United Kingdom.See IRS, FBAR Reference Guide, http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/irsfbarreferenceguide.pdf (last visited July 19, 2016) (“Typically, a financial account that is maintained with a financial institution located outside of the United States is a foreign financial account.”).

In contrast, Hom’s PokerStars and PartyPoker accounts do not fall within the definition of a “bank, securities, or other financial account.” PartyPoker and PokerStars primarily facilitate online gambling. Hom could carry a balance on his PokerStars account, and indeed he needed a certain balance in order to “sit” down to a poker game. But the funds were used to play poker and there is no evidence that PokerStars served any other financial purpose for Hom. Hom’s PartyPoker account functioned in essentially same manner.

May 25, 2016

Law360

The U.S. Department of Justice’s filing of criminal charges against a Chicago restaurant owner who failed to pay state sales tax demonstrates the perils business owners face if they underreport their gross receipts to avoid paying sales tax. Hu Xiaojun, who owns and operates nine restaurants in the Chicago area, was charged with federal wire fraud and money laundering offenses arising from his failure to pay Illinois sales tax on nearly $10 million in cash transactions occurring at his restaurants over a four-year period.[1] On May 16, 2016, Xiaojun pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud and one count of money laundering. He faces a prison sentence of 41 to 51 months, and must pay restitution of over $1 million to the Illinois Department of Revenue as well as forfeit an additional amount as punishment for his misconduct. Sentencing is scheduled for Aug. 22, 2016.

The Offense Conduct

According to the publicly filed guilty plea agreement, between January 2010 and September 2014, Xiaojun failed to pay sales tax on transactions in which customers paid cash. To conceal cash sales, he instructed restaurant managers and employees to provide him with daily summaries of restaurant sales, which he would in turn alter to conceal cash sales. Xiaojun and others would destroy the daily summary reports and cash transactions receipts, replacing them with incorrect reports that omitted the bulk of each restaurant’s cash sales. To hide cash sales from the state tax authorities, the defendant instructed employees to withhold cash generated from the restaurants from the corporate bank accounts to avoid creating financial records for those cash sales. The defendant instead used the cash to pay restaurant employees and suppliers without recording those expenses in the corporate books and records. The defendant also deposited a portion of the cash into his personal bank account, which he then used to pay personal expenses.

During the 2010 to 2014 time period, the defendant instructed others to submit fraudulent sales figures to the Illinois Department of Revenue on monthly sales tax returns. Each month, the defendant directed his employees to provide false sales figures to his accountants, who in turn provided those figures to the state. In all, the defendant underreported his sales to the state by nearly $10 million, resulting in his underpayment of sales taxes by more than $1.1 million.

The wire fraud charge to which the defendant pleaded guilty is based upon his sending of an email containing false sales figures for the month of May 2014. The money laundering charge to which the defendant pleaded guilty is based upon a series of financial transactions that he conducted using proceeds of his scheme to defraud the Illinois Department of Revenue. Specifically, the defendant deposited over $72,000 in cash into his personal bank account, which he knew consisted of funds derived from cash sales at his restaurants that were concealed from the state tax authorities. The defendant thereafter withdrew $60,000 from that account and purchased an official bank check, which he then deposited into a different business account. The defendant used the funds in that second bank account to purchase a restaurant and equipment, which he subsequently operated.

Analysis 

At first glance, the facts of United States v. Xiaojun read like a typical criminal tax case and include the all-too-common attributes of tax fraud in the restaurant industry: the concealment of cash sales and the use of diverted cash to pay employees, purveyors and personal expenses of the restaurant’s owners. Indeed, the Justice Department’s website is replete with press releases announcing criminal tax charges against restaurant owners who engaged in conduct similar to that of Xiaojun, mostly commonly filing of false income tax returns in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206 or tax evasion in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7201.

For example, in United States v. Happy Asker, the owner of a chain of pizza restaurants in the Detroit area engaged in what the government called “a systematic and pervasive tax fraud scheme to defraud the IRS” by substantially underreporting gross sales and payroll amounts on corporate income tax returns and employment tax returns filed for nearly 60 restaurant locations.[2] Over a three-year period, the defendant and his co-conspirators diverted for personal use more than $6.1 million in cash gross receipts and failed to report approximately $3.84 million of gross income and pay approximately $2.39 million in payroll taxes. A portion of the unreported income was shared among the defendant and most of his franchise owners, in a weekly cash “profit split.” As a result of this conduct, the defendant was charged with, and later convicted of, typical Title 26 offenses: filing false personal income tax returns, aiding and assisting in the filing of false corporate income and employment tax returns for several pizza restaurants, and obstructing and impeding the administration of the Internal Revenue Code.

In another fairly typical case, United States v. Ramon S. Arias, the defendant owned numerous Little Caesars pizza franchises in Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana. In a written plea agreement, the defendant admitted that between 2010 and 2013, he “skimmed” hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash from his restaurants and concealed these cash receipts from his accountant. As a result, the S corporation tax returns underreported gross receipts from the restaurants, and those omissions flowed through to the defendant’s personal income tax returns. The defendant pleaded guilty to one count of filing a false 2013 personal income tax return in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7206(1) and agreed to pay restitution to the Internal Revenue Service for the years 2010 through 2013.[3]

What makes United States v. Xiaojun notable is that the Justice Department chose not to assert a single federal tax charge against the defendant. Based upon admissions in his plea agreement, the defendant presumably failed to report as taxable income the concealed cash receipts, thereby likely exposing him to multiple federal income tax charges during the five tax years at issue (2010 through 2014). In addition, the defendant’s payment of his employees in cash presumably could have led to employment tax-related charges. But instead of charging Title 26 offenses, the government transformed this garden-variety criminal tax case into a wire fraud and money laundering case by focusing on the defendant’s failure to pay state sales taxes.

Tax Division Directive No. 128

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Under Tax Directive No. 128, prosecutors may now use mail and wire fraud offenses and, more importantly, state tax violations where the mails or wire communication facilities are used, to transform cases that traditionally would be prosecuted under the tax laws into fraud and money laundering prosecutions. By charging mail and wire fraud in tax cases, the government can significantly change the charging and plea bargaining process. The mere threat of a mail fraud or money laundering charge may well cause targets of government investigations to plead guilty more willingly, and to agree to cooperate against other targets, than would have been likely under the prior policy where the charges were likely limited to federal tax offenses absent exceptional circumstances. In addition, the ability to include mail or wire fraud charges in a tax-related case provides prosecutors with an additional tool not previously available in traditional tax cases — the ability to seek forfeiture of the proceeds of the fraudulent scheme.

By relying upon the authority conferred by Tax Directive No. 128, the government could significantly ratchet up the pressure on the defendant in United States v. Xiaojun. By bringing charges under Title 18 rather than Title 26, the government was able to seek a longer prison sentence: the statutory maximum sentences available for mail fraud and money laundering, 20 years each, are significantly higher than the statutory maximum sentences available for tax fraud or tax evasion, which are three years and five years, respectively. In addition, the United States Sentencing Guidelines for mail fraud and money laundering crimes typically call for longer sentences than those applicable to tax offenses.

Charging mail fraud and money laundering also enabled the government to seek restitution to be paid to the state agency that was defrauded. Had the government only charged federal tax crimes under Title 26, restitution could only have been ordered to the Internal Revenue Service, as occurred in United States v. Asker and United States v. Arias. The government was also able to seek forfeiture of the funds that constitute proceeds of the mail fraud and money laundering offenses, an additional punishment that is not available for tax offenses. As part of his plea agreement, Xiaojun agreed to pay at least $1 million in restitution to the Illinois Department of Revenue and to entry of a forfeiture judgment in an amount to be determined by the court at sentencing. The defendant also agreed as part of his plea agreement to cooperate with the civil tax audit that will inevitably follow his conviction, thereby ensuring that the IRS will be able to assess any tax, interest and penalties that are determined to be due and owing.

United States v. Xiaojun illustrates well how Tax Directive No. 128 provides federal prosecutors with significantly more leeway in charging offenses in what are viewed as traditional tax cases. No longer confined to the criminal offenses enumerated in Title 26, federal prosecutors can significantly increase the pressure on defendants by charging mail fraud and money laundering, seeking longer sentences and extracting substantial financial penalties by requiring defendants to pay both restitution and forfeiture.

Footnotes

[1] See United States v. Hu Xiaojun, No. 16-cr-316 (N.D. Ill.).

[2] See U.S. Department of Justice Press Release, “Happy’s Pizza Founder Convicted of Multi-Million Dollar Tax Fraud Scheme” (Nov. 19, 2014).

[3] See U.S. Department of Justice Press Release, “Owner of Pizza Franchises Pleads Guilty to Submitting False Tax Return That Omitted Income From Skimmed Cash” (May 24, 2016).

“Chicago Restaurant Tax Case Highlights Broad DOJ Authority,” by Matthew D. Lee was published in Law360 on May 25, 2016. Click here to read the article online.

On May 9, 2016, the Justice Department announced that Gregg R. Mulholland, a dual U.S. and Canadian citizen and owner of an offshore broker-dealer and investment management company based in Panama and Belize, pleaded guilty to money laundering conspiracy for fraudulently manipulating the stocks of more than 40 U.S. publicly-traded companies and then laundering more than $250 million in profits through at least five offshore law firms. This prosecution is notable in that it represents the first time the Justice Department has brought criminal charges against individuals for conspiring to violate reporting requirements under the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA).

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According to the indictment, the defendants’ scheme also enabled U.S. clients to evade reporting requirements to the IRS by concealing the proceeds generated by the manipulated stock transactions through the shell companies and their nominees. For example, in response to a request received by a U.S. corrupt client from a U.S. transfer agent who had to determine whether the proceeds from manipulative stock trading transaction were taxable under U.S. law, one of the defendants forwarded an IRS Form signed by a co-defendant as the nominee for the shell company which had been set up at the request of the client.

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With respect to FATCA, the indictment alleges as follows:

     13.       The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (“FATCA”) was a federal law enacted in March 2010 that targeted tax non-compliance by U.S. taxpayers with foreign accounts.  Although enforcement did not commence until July 2014, FATCA required U.S. persons to report their foreign financial accounts and offshore assets.  Additionally, FATCA required foreign financial institutions to report to the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) certain financial information about accounts held by US. taxpayers or foreign entities in which U.S. taxpayers held a substantial ownership interest.  FATCA also targeted the non-reporting and the non-withholding (30% on certain U.S. source payments made to foreign entities) by U.S. financial institutions based on material misrepresentations about the beneficial owners of the foreign accounts.

The indictment reveals that law enforcement authorities employed undercover agents and wiretaps to record numerous conversations involving the defendants.  In one recorded meeting, two of the defendants bragged that their strategy enabled clients to evade FATCA’s requirements:

During this meeting, BANDFIELD and GODFREY touted, inter alia, IPC CORP’s success in establishing fraudulent corporate structures, including six IBCs and two LLCs for the Undercover Agent in order to conceal the Undercover Agent’s true beneficial ownership of the brokerage accounts at LEGACY, TITAN, UNICORN and two additional broker-dealers. BANDFIELD explained that this “slick” structure was specifically designed to counter U.S. President Barack Obama’s new laws, a reference to FATCA.

On a recorded telephone call, one of the defendants told a client that the use of offshore nominee companies was specifically intended to evade FATCA’s reporting requirements:

On or about May 19, 2014, GODFREY called Corrupt Client 6, an individual whose identity is known to the Grand Jury, and stated that IPC CORP’s fraudulent scheme using sham IBC and LLC structures was created to evade the IRS, specifically FATCA.

Although the Justice Department has been aggressively targeting offshore tax evasion by U.S. taxpayers since 2009, this case represents the first time that the government has brought criminal charges based upon alleged violations of FATCA.  With FATCA’s provisions only becoming effective on July 1, 2014, and with the Justice Department’s offshore crackdown showing no signs of slowing down, we expect to see more criminal prosecutions in the future alleging violations of FATCA’s provisions.