Taxable Talk

Orange County Billionaire Igor Olenicoff sued UBS, the Swiss Banking Giant, alleging that they conned him into breaking US Tax Laws. Mr. Olenicoff is alleging that when a giant company tells you that they will obey the law everything just has to be kosher. Mr. Olenicoff, as you may remember, received a very light sentence after pleading guilty to tax evasion.

In any case, this should make for some interesting reading in the coming months.

If you want to get on the bad side of a judge a very good way to do so is to file fake warrants and fraudulent leans and attempt to "arrest" the judge. It's an especially Bozo thing to do when you're going to be sentenced by that judge.

Never underestimate the stupidity of some of the tax protesters. Indeed, Robert Beale did all of those things as I wrote earlier. Today, when he was sentenced by Judge Ann Montgomery, he told the Court, "I do not consent to incarceration, fine or supervised release...," he said. "I have not committed a crime." Unfortunately for Mr. Beale, the judge and jury felt quite differently. And his remarks probably reinforced Judge Montgomery's bad impression of him. He'll have 11 years at ClubFed of nonconsensual incarceration. Additionally, he's still facing charges over his attempt to sentence Judge Montgomery.

Joe Kristan has more.

One of the questions that comes up from time to time is whether you have to pay tax on illegal income. After all, do thieves really report their thefts to the IRS? I usually remind those questioning this that Al Capone went to prison for tax evasion, not for the murders he committed.

What brought this up is a story from Rogers, Arkansas. Douglas Haase was an employee of Kraft/Nabisco. He thought up an almost perfect plan. He would submit fake expense reports to two conspirators in Florida, and they in turn would send checks through a sports management firm so that he could pay off his personal credit cards. And this wasn't a small amount of money—Mr. Haase apparently received $1.5 million from this scheme. Mr. Haase will have three years to think about this while at ClubFed. He also has to pay a $150,000 fine.

So if you decide to go into a life of crime, just remember to set aside some of your ill-gotten gains to pay your taxes.