Taxable Talk

Wesley Snipes fired his attorneys for his upcoming tax evasion trial. The Ocala Star-Banner reports that Snipes new attorney, Robert G. Bernhoft, told Judge Terrell Hodges, “The scope and prejudicial effect of this pervasive ineffective assistance of counsel only recently came to Snipes’ attention, causing an irreparable breach in the attorney-client relationship with his former attorneys, and precipitating their discharge by Snipes, and the hiring of new trial counsel.”

Hogwash, according to Judge Hodges. “This series of events would lead any reasonable person to suspect that the defendant’s dismissal of able counsel is nothing more than a ploy designed to force a continuance of the trial,” Hodges said, as reported by The Smoking Gun. The trial will start, as scheduled, on October 22nd.

Snipes’ former attorney was William Martin. Martin has represented many famous individuals, including Senator Larry Craig, Michael Vick, and Allen Iverson. Interestingly enough, The Smoking Gun notes that Snipes’ new attorney has represented several tax protesters in the past. And there’s more.

A quick search found that Mr. Bernhoft has faced the IRS before as a defendant in a tax protester case. Back in 1996, Mr. Bernhoft and Robert Raymond operated “Morningstar Consultants” in Milwaukee. They ran advertisements saying “Just Say No”: The IRS, according to Bernhoft and Raymond when they operated Morningstar Consultants, has no right to compel you to file a tax return, to require withholding, and a number of other tax protester arguments. The IRS filed suit against them for their “De-Taxing America” program and won at the District Court level; they were permanently enjoined from marketing this program. They appealed, and the District Court ruling was upheld.

The Appeals Court found plenty of problems with the “De-Taxing America” program. “The statements appellants made in the Just Say No advertisement are clearly false representations concerning the government’s authority to tax its citizens…We attribute to both appellants a basic knowledge of the law such that they should reasonably be aware that their personal belief that paying taxes is a voluntary activity does not represent the current state of the law.”

Anyway, Mr. Snipes appears to have found an attorney who believes—unless his views have changed in the past few years—that taxes are voluntary and that Mr. Snipes is right that only foreign income is taxable. These kinds of arguments have a batting average well below the Mendoza line in court. Of course, at this time Mr. Snipes is only alleged to have committed these acts. But tax protester arguments are extremely unlikely to be successful in this kind of case.

Based on this development, I think we’re going to have a lot of humorous moments during Mr. Snipes’ upcoming trial. But I have a feeling that Mr. Snipes won’t be laughing much at the end.

News Reports:

Ocala Star-Banner
The Smoking Gun

Poor Wesley Snipes. As you may remember, Snipes will soon be on trial for allegedly filing a false claim for an income tax refund. As Joe Kristan of Roth Tax Updates reports, Mr. Snipes lost the lead in Spike Lee’s new World War II film. His passport has been seized pending the trial.

If found guilty, Snipes will likely lose a lot more roles as he’d probably be spending some time at ClubFed.