Tax Lawyer's Blog

To extinguish the free will is to strike the conscience with death, for both have but one and the same life.

- William Ellery Channing-

Joe Kristan of Tax Updates blogged about an interesting, new defense chronic non-filers can use when charged with intentionally failing to file their income tax returns: 

Lawyers for top Paterson administration aide Charles O’Byrne claimed Wednesday he failed to pay taxes for five years because he has “non-filer syndrome.” These are very high-functioning people who otherwise can complete all of the ordinary tasks in their lives,” O’Byrne lawyer Richard Kestenbaum insisted. “But there is something that they can’t do, and many times that causes them not to be able to file their tax returns.” 

And here’s a quote from the Tax Girl:

[I]t’s much easier to blame it on a “syndrome”, isn’t it? That’s what we do in America. Nothing is ever our own fault, it’s some sort of “thing” that we can’t control. It’s always a syndrome, a disorder, a complex. And sadly, it cheapens the plights of those who actually do suffer from serious problems.

I am embarrassed for the legal profession when one of our members comes up with some birdbrained abuse-excuse defense like this. It makes us all look bad.

What’s next, “I had to rape her syndrome?” A malady that effects high-functioning alpha males in positions of great power who are unaccustomed to hearing the word “no.”

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