Dr. Garland D. Miller was a successful physician in Zwolle, Louisiana. He even served as Sabine Parish’s elected coroner. He went through an IRS audit in 1995 and then decided to take action.
Now, we don’t have the results of the audit so we can only speculate as to what actually occurred. Suffice to say, it’s unlikely it went well for Dr. Miller. So assume you went through a bad audit. Would you (a) Discuss with your accountant tax saving strategies, (b) Embezzle money from your employer, or (c) Purchase a publication from a foundation that argues that the income tax doesn’t apply and then implement their strategies?
After the audit he purchased a publication from Save a Patriot Foundation that argued that you don’t have to pay income tax. Interestingly enough, in 2006 a court ordered that a notice be put on their home page that states, “The District Court orders…That Defendants…are hereby permanently enjoined from directly or indirectly: …Advising anyone that they are not required to file federal tax returns or pay federal taxes….” But I digress.
Dr. Miller then ceased filing tax returns. In 2000 he sold his office building to De Soto Regional Health System and became an employee. He was supposed to remit substantially all of his medical income to De Soto but didn’t. There’s a word for that—embezzlement.
After the local District Attorney investigated, the IRS joined in. Dr. Miller was convicted of tax evasion (it took the jury just two hours to reach a verdict). He’ll be sentenced in October and will likely get to spend some time at ClubFed.
If someone ever hands you a publication that says you don’t have to pay an income tax just laugh and note that it’s good fiction. For if you take it as non-fiction you probably won’t like the consequences.