Tax Crimes

On April 25, 2019, FBI and IRS agents executed search warrants and raided Baltimore Mayor Pugh’s home, City Hall, the apartment of a Pugh aide, and the Maryland Center for Adult Training amid the Baltimore “Bookgate” corruption scandal. The raid is the first public display of federal law involvement. Soon after the raid, Maryland Governor […]

Detroit –The man charged with fixing Detroit’s faltering finances has been hit with four liens in four years from the state of Maryland for unpaid taxes, records show. State records show Kevyn D. Orr, who was appointed emergency manager on Thursday, has two outstanding liens on his $1 million home in Chevy Chase, Md., for […]

The Department of Justice recently indicted five individuals for obstruction of the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) administration of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA). These individuals allegedly agreed to open offshore accounts without collecting required FATCA information. The agency accuses these individuals of scheming to evade reporting requirements. As noted in a recent press […]

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) audited approximately 934,000 tax returns in 2017. The IRS conducted 70.8 percent of these audits via a mailed correspondence and 29.2 through a full field investigation. The IRS uses these investigations to determine if taxpayers are correctly reporting income and expenses. In some cases the evidence gathered during an initial […]

The second wave of leaks about the use of offshore accounts is making its way through the media. The first was dubbed the Panama Papers; the latest, the Paradise Papers. What exactly are the Paradise Papers? The term refers to over 13.4 million documents connected primarily to a law firm that aids the wealthy with […]

The Swiss insurance industry is now under close scrutiny by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). One insurance provider in the nation, Swiss Life, recently announced that it is under investigation by the DOJ. Why would the DOJ dig into insurance companies for wrongdoing? A recent publication on swissinfo.ch discusses the move. It notes […]

In some cases, those who conduct certain qualifying transactions using a foreign trust, those who own a foreign trust or those who receive a gift or bequest from a foreign person must file special tax documentation. It is important to make sure these dealings are in compliance with tax laws, or else harsh penalties can […]

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is not relaxing its crackdown on the proper taxation of foreign financial accounts. Part of the agency’s efforts include requiring foreign financial institutions (FFIs) to provide the agency with information about persons from the United States that hold accounts within their institutions. The agency recently announced that the process required […]

In the first part of this post, we discussed the scenario of getting a computer-generated notice informing you that the IRS is proposing changes to your return. This can happen when the income you reported doesn’t match information the IRS has received about your income from employers, banks or other third parties. In this part […]

Tax-refund fraud remains a huge problem. Scammers have gotten away with billions of dollars in recent years and stolen the identities of a bewildering number of people. Will the 2017 filing season be any better? Here are three things to know to help minimize the risk that you your refund or your identity will be […]