Federal Tax Cases To Watch In 2019
On the docket in 2019 are several federal tax cases worthy of practitioners’ attention, including disputes over domestic manufacturing deductions, the statute of limitations on fraud and the clergy housing tax exemption. …Mary A. McNulty, a partner at Thompson & Knight LLP, told Law360 that the Tax Court’s ruling was contrary to a Federal Circuit opinion, BASR Partnership v. United States . In BASR Partnership the Federal Circuit in 2015 denied the IRS’ request to rehear en banc its decision that the service missed a three-year deadline to assess a $6.5 million fraudulent return penalty linked to an ex-Jenkens & Gilchrist PC attorney’s $7 billion tax shelter scheme. “If the Eleventh Circuit rules in favor of the commissioner, a circuit split will result, setting up a potential U.S. Supreme Court review,” she said. “Personally, I don’t think the IRS should be able to impute a third party’s fraudulent intent to a taxpayer to extend the statute of limitations for assessments, so long as the taxpayer had no knowledge of the fraud.”