Posts Tagged ‘Tax Fraud’

Tax Shelters the IRS Doesn’t Like

January 7th, 2012



Tax shelters can be good–reducing your taxable income. But tax shelters can be bad–illegal and causing participants to commit tax fraud. How to know what shelters to avoid? The key is education, read the IRS forms, and pay attention. The old caveat, if it sounds too good, it’s most likely bad, is very often true. The best tax shelter for the business owner is to use sound tax planning strategies and think of your business as a legal way to avoid and rightfully reduce taxes. It is all in the deductions and keeping good records (receipts, checks, daily journals).

A tax shelter is a type of investment that allows people to reduce their tax liability. Pension plans and real estate investments are good examples. Persons can reduce taxable income if you have losses on investments. These are all legal strategies. But fraudulent or “abusive tax shelters” are considered by the IRS to use many schemes to filter or hide transactions: trusts, off-shore credit/debit cards, hedges, circular cash flows, defeasances, insurance schemes, and other activities are all attempts to hide. If investments insulate the client from significant economic risk, the courts have decided they are not appropriate.

The IRS considers tax shelters “abusive” when they are designed solely for avoiding taxes. They have no other significant business purpose. There are various means to do the abusive practices–helping clients falsify tax losses or report phony tax losses. In 2005, KPMG, a Big Four accounting firm, cost the U.S. $2.5 billion, according to the Department of Justice, by helping clients to develop tax losses. The following scenario (from Grace Wong, a reporter from CNN’s website “Money”) is a simplified explanation of one method such firms used to help clients develop tax losses.

Here’s an example:

* Joe is a new millionaire and has capital gains of $20 million. He wants to create an “artificial” loss.

* Joe places an option in identical amounts and prices on the euro /U.S. dollar for exchange rates. He buys a call option with the right to buy Euros at a certain price on or before a certain date for a premium of $20 million. He writes an option with the same strike price and expiration date for $20 million. The premiums offset each other.

* Joe then transfers the option to a partner in a friendly “accommodation” partnership, someone who paid big fees to enter into a partnership with no real business purpose.

* When he sells for zero profit, Joe claims a tax loss of $20 million, even though he’s incurred no real economic loss.

Hard to follow the details? The concepts of many bad tax shelters lack definable business purpose. An “abusive tax shelter” is a marketing scheme that offers tax transactions with little or no economic value. In the real world people invest money to make money. The bad kind of tax shelters offer inflated tax savings based on large tax write offs and tax credits out of proportion to your investment. There is no real economic investment. An abusive tax shelter often involves little risk and its tax write off ratio is frequently much greater than one-to-one. If you use a tax shelter, be sure to file Form 8271 from the IRS. Read the experts. Read the known tax shelter abusers listed on the government’s IRS site. And below are some of the worst schemes for abusive tax shelters.

Tax Shelters the IRS Dislikes
Lease In Lease Out(LILO) Sale In Lease Out (SILO) Partnership Straddle Corporation Owned Life Insurance Sham Transactions (COLI) Overseas Shelters

Tax Fraud Lawyers

November 9th, 2011



Some individuals and organizations do not follow the standard procedure of paying their share of taxes to the government. By not doing so, they are committing a crime under the income tax laws of the US. The act of flaunting the rules and laws institutionalized for the proper functioning of the government is considered a serious offence. These types of crimes are termed as white-collar crimes in legal circles, as civilized citizens with no history of crimes commit these offences.

Tax fraud is a term used to refer to offenses such as tax evasion, non-filing of tax returns, forgery, non-declaration of assets and income, misrepresentation of conditions for the purpose of tax exemption and other such actions related to the payment of taxes. Tax fraud lawyers are specialized attorneys that deal with issues of tax fraud and represent clients who are accused of tax fraud.

Unlike other kinds of tax lawyers, tax fraud lawyers do not advice on tax planning or filing of income tax returns. Clients specifically employ them when they anticipate government interrogation regarding their taxes or after they have been charged for tax fraud. Though the issue is morally wrong, tax fraud lawyers work on ways to negotiate with tax authorities and help their clients legally evade taxes to a limited extent and mitigate their situation with regard to the charge of tax fraud.

Many tax frauds are caused due to limited or erroneous knowledge of the tax laws. Some tax consultants misguide their clients with contradictory tax plans, which ultimately results in unplanned tax evasion. If an attorney proves that his client is the innocent victim of wrong tax advice by some tax consultants, it?s likely that the charges against them might get dropped or a lenient sentence might be passed. It is very important to select tax consultants carefully as only those with proper industry certifications and detailed exposure to such cases can help people solve what can be tricky situations with the IRS.

The most common method adopted by tax fraud lawyers to get relief for their clients is by convincing the tax authorities that prosecuting the defaulter will do more harm than good and would not fetch them the recoverable tax dues. When this line of reasoning is well presented, the authorities might settle for the middle path by accepting payments in installments or waiving off a part of the tax dues instead of prosecuting them.

Suspected Tax Crimes and Tax Audit

September 5th, 2010



When taking actions according to provisions for Criminal Prosecution, the auditor should know the Code of Criminal Procedures and the Criminal Prosecution Law. Based on that, the Head of Tax Audit should periodically issue audit directives for tax offices. All cases included in the category of cases forwarded to the Head of Tax Audit should come in the required format and contain all the required data if the case is forwarded for further actions.

The investigator can also investigate other areas. Questions are formulated in different forms and the following steps can be adopted: Observations in the investigated taxpayer’s economic activity premises without taxpayer’s knowledge of this; active search for information in sources external to tax administration and the company’s business registers; meetings with the taxpayer which is informed that the purpose of the meeting is to determine whether he is guilty and liable for potential criminal prosecution for discovered tax fraud.

According to the Code of Criminal Procedure, if the criminal action has caused material damage, the accused taxpayer should be sent for civil prosecution and the civil plaintiff should claim the return of property or reward for the damage. The civil plaintiff becomes legitimate before the court review starts. The request should contain general information of the damaged plaintiff and the accused. It should also contain the reasons for the request, signature of damaged plaintiff or his representative, name and surname of representative and authorization. In a criminal process it is the legitimate manager of the audited taxpayer in cooperation with the auditors who can initiate civil accusations.

The following summary of rules of evidence is presented here as a guide for auditors as well as intelligence and investigation inspectors:

Types of evidence:
1. Material evidence, data obtained from material objects
2. Written evidence, which can be:
2.1. Primary (original documents considered as most reliable), or
2.2. Secondary (copies or witnesses using notes taken from the original or its summary).

Secondary documentation of evidence is usually applied only when:
2.2.1. The document is owned by another party and the auditor cannot finally administer it;
2.2.2. The original is lost or destroyed;
2.2.3. It is impossible to physically produce the original (e.g. a script on a wall);
2.2.4. It is prohibited to remove the original (e.g. some public documents);
3. Confirmation of data intends to confirm the truthfulness of previously collected evidence. Confirmation of data is essential in the following circumstances:
3.1. When admission or confession is made by an accused person
3.2. Evidence is collected by kids
3.3. Evidence is collected by accomplice

The following are sources from which the investigator can collect evidence to prove tax fraud:

- Material evidence: existing materials which provide the basis for the evidence, representational selections of materials, original documents or data;
- Searches in the theater of the event;
- Information from the public, informers, department officials;
- data inspection;
- supervision;
- interviews with employees;
- Interviews with suspects (if possible)

1. The criterion of validity or acceptability of written evidence remains with:
- the party that created (signed) it;
- someone who witnessed it being created or signed;
- someone who recognizes the writing and is able to identify it;
- Expert (legal).

2. Evidence is considered such in a case if it tends to prove the existence of facts being discussed. Not every information can be evidence.

3. Evidence is acceptable if it does not breach one of the following rules:
- it is based on gossip;
- it is based on similar acts or facts;
- it is based on opinions or suppositions;
- it is incompatible with the suspect’s character (this is subjective but worthy of consideration);
- it is given by a person but accuses the suspect.

The investigator is in search of any evidence to confirm violations and guilt in the taxpayer’s activity which could send the taxpayer for criminal prosecution. The amount of revenue in investigation cases is likely to be considerable and this is why the investigation time is longer. Meetings with the taxpayer in question have another perspective, as the investigator’s questions intend to extract information not only about the taxpayer’s problems but also the persons involved in fraud.

International Tax Attorneys

September 5th, 2010

Taxes must be paid on the basis not just of income earned within the country, but also outside the national borders. The IRS has international tax laws that deal with such income and an international tax attorney will be able to give you the best possible information on international tax laws. This will enable you to take advantage of legal exemptions and credits without the risk of committing tax fraud.

International tax attorneys act as advisors for anyone with sources of income outside the national border, from multinational organizations and US citizens living abroad, to US residents with property, assets, or businesses abroad.

International tax attorneys advise international business firms on issues like mergers, joint ventures, expansion, contracts, and leases. They negotiate on the basis of tax agreements between the US and other countries. They assist in structuring the company from a tax point of view.

For non-resident US citizens, international tax attorneys help secure certain exemptions from having to pay double income or property tax in form of a tax to the country of residence as well as to the IRS. They deal with issues of transfer pricing on tax, foreign estate laws, customs duty, and income tax laws. They also fight cases for US citizens charged with tax fraud abroad.

With more and more multinational firms expanding their businesses worldwide and the fluid world of e-commerce making borders redundant, business transactions between US and foreign firms have gone up, which brings the tax laws of many countries into play. The services of the international tax attorney are crucial for these companies.

Also, more US citizens are working and settling abroad and foreign citizens are choosing to own property in the US. This makes the assistance of an international tax attorney essential for not just big firms, but also ordinary citizens.