Brian Peterson went to his Supervisor. “Sir, while this is probably a suicide, there is no note and no evidence of intent to defraud the government. My view is that we’d get our heads handed to us on this.” “Thanks, Brian, let’s call the General Counsel and see what he has to say.” The called the Chief Counsel, “If we can’t prove fraud and have no probable cause to search for a note, there is no sense in wasting our time on this, prepare a closing letter.”

Three weeks later.
Becky saw the envelope from the IRS. It was thin. She tore it open and saw that it was a closing letter. She closed her eyes and let fly a deep sigh and put it in a file. Her next call was to the Mercedes dealer. “Might as well stimulate the economy”.

Next Tax Tale will deal with some crazy questions involving deaths in 2010 and basis issues on capital gains. With that, one precautionary word. If we have another foot of snow here in DC and the power or phone lines get damages, I might be off line for 24 hours. So, don’t give up on me.
J

Brian Peterson looked at the return on his desk. It was cut and dried, the lady died in a car accident in 2010. He looked at the death certificate and saw Laura Holden’s signature at the bottom, he smiled and looked in the desk drawer at the diamond ring he had bought her when he proposed which was on Friday night. He noticed at that point the third contributing cause of death, suicide. He picked up the telephone and called her. “Hi, honey this is Brian, how’s the smartest most attractive coroner doing?” “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Laura cooed. “This is kind of a business call”, Brian said hesitantly. “What’s up?” Laura replied. “I’m looking at a death certificate for Bea Gooding and your signature is on it, could you pull your file on that case?” Brian asked. “Sure”, Laura answered. She pulled the file and came back to the phone, “Brian, yea, it was a single car accident, no witnesses, drove right into a concrete barrier, died of trauma shortly after the accident, never regain consciousness. I put suicide as a possible contributing cause, because single car accidents are almost always suicides. Why are you interested in my autopsy?” Brian cleared his throat. “Its possible, that her suicide could be grounds to assert tax fraud, we’ve never tried it, but it means about $150 Million of difference taxwise”. “Wow”, Laura replied. “The problem is that its only a hunch on my part”, Laura said. “For all I know she could have dozed off, it was late at night, or she could have been blinded by a car light, or dropped something on the floor and reached down to pick it up. How right do you want me to be on this?” Brian thought for a moment and asked, “Did anyone find a suicide note?” “No, not that I am aware of”, Laura replied. “You need to ask the family that question”.

No her daughter was not pregnant. Bea’s attorney filed the Federal Estate Tax return. Her net estate after funeral expenses and debts was $299,985,000. The Estate tax bill was zero since she died in the year 2010. (Nota Bene this is still currently the law which could be changed at any moment). The return was filed with the Internal Revenue Service and marked for prompt assessment. As required by the regulations a copy of the death certificate was appended to the return. (At this point the story could go in two directions – namely if Congress retroactively reimposed an estate tax and the other if Congress did not, we will follow the later assumption). By filing a request for prompt assessment, the Service has nine months to audit the return or the Executor is personally off the hook for the tax.