by Brian Mahany We are never surprised anymore when the feds announce a new wave of indictments against taxpayers with unreported accounts. Until 2008, the IRS didn’t look very hard and prosecutions were few. As the economy has soured, tax authorities around the world have become quite creative in finding new revenue streams. To enforce […]
Treasury Hunting Nominee Accounts – IRS Whistleblower Post
[Updated 2021] The U.S. government is getting quite sophisticated in its hunt for unreported foreign accounts and those they believe are laundering money. While most people who haven’t reported their offshore bank and brokerage accounts don’t have a clue about the disclosure rules, some do. The people who have decided not to cooperate with the […]
Author of "Bulletproof Asset Protection" Indicted!
by Brian Mahany William Reed is a former lawyer and the author of the book titled “Bulletproof Asset Protection.” As of July 2011 he can add an indictment to his resume. The feds have charged Reed with Conspiracy to Defraud the United States, Money Laundering Conspiracy and multiple counts of Aggravated Identity Theft, Mail Fraud, […]
Lawyer Indicted For Helping Clients Set Up Offshore Swiss Bank Accounts
by Brian Mahany The IRS and U.S. Department of Justice show no sign of letting up in their quest to ferret out U.S. taxpayers with unreported offshore accounts. Earlier this week Justice officials unsealed an indictment against a former San Diego tax attorney and two of his clients for alleging hiding millions in unreported Swiss […]
New Directive Says IRS Can Seek Metadata
An Information Letter Memorandum issued by the Chief Counsel of the IRS (ILM 201146017) says the IRS can summons metadata from taxpayers. Just about everything we do on a computer carries a trail of metadata. This stored information tells how data was formatted, modified and created. For those not familiar with metadata, we take our […]
Islamic Banks Next Target of IRS? (IRS Whistleblower Rewards Post)
[Arabis translation below – الترجمة العربية أدناه] Beginning in 2007, the IRS began cracking down on Americans and other U.S. taxpayers with unreported foreign accounts. Owning an offshore account isn’t illegal but failing to report the account is. First, Swiss banks began to be the targets. The government accused UBS and several other Swiss banks […]
Uncle Sam Goes After Another Welfare Benefit Plan Scheme
by Brian Mahany The IRS and U.S. Department Justice Department have a special relationship with welfare benefit plan promoters and the brokers and insurance agents that sell them. They hate them. For over a decade, the IRS has declared that many welfare benefit plans are fraudulent and abusive tax shelters. Many of the promoters are […]
America's Tax Gap – Who Is At Fault And What Should We Do About It
by Brian Mahany America’s tax gap – the difference between what the IRS collects and what it should collect. Estimates differ widely but everyone agrees that it is measured in the hundreds of billions of dollars annually. In the last comprehensive study, the IRS estimated it collects 84% of what is due each year. President […]
Tax Avoidance Schemes and Whistleblower Rewards
Hiding Money from Uncle Sam? Don’t! Every failed tax scheme started with folks who didn’t think they would get caught. And many of the people who end up in prison are pretty smart people. Doctors, lawyers, business executives and even billionaires. Each thought they had a foolproof idea. Many of those ideas involve tax avoidance […]
Feds Target CPA’s, Lawyers – IRS Whistleblower Post
[Post updated March 2021] When this post was written ten years earlier, the Justice Department had just convicted the former chairman of prominent CPA firm BDO Seidman as well as two attorneys from Jenkens and Gilchrist. The three were convicted for for their role in a massive scheme to promote abusive tax shelters. The government […]