true crime

KN, p. 308 “Tax Fraud”

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In 1789, Benjamin Franklin said, “Nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

234 years later? It’s still true.

April 18th was tax day in the USA. By midnight that day, the bill must have been paid, either via mail date-stamped by the Post Office, or online. After that, if you owed money and didn’t send it in, penalties began to add up.

Government at every level imposes taxes in order to pay its bills. Roads, schools, civil defense, water control, government employees, and more…all get a piece of the revenue pie.

So what happens if you don’t file taxes? It is a crime not to pay and a definite no-no not to file. Since this is about money and the government needs more of it to run the programs, there are fines if you forget (or don’t want to pay), even jail time in certain cases.

Penalties

  • Not filing taxes: 5% of the tax owed for each month the return is past due.
  • More than 60 days late filing: A minimum fine of $435. Maximum fine is 25% of the total owed. (Plus the amount you owe)
  • Not paying at all: 0.5% of the unpaid taxes for each month the outstanding taxes aren’t paid, plus interest. Ouch.

The government can choose to play nice with people “who have never done this before” and there are extensions available. BUT, not everyone gets a pass and only in rare instances.

Your house burns down? Better call the tax people and get an extension in writing. Those taxes are still due and penalties still accrue, but there might be a bargain to be struck if the agent is having a good day. You might be able to negotiate a six-month extension, but you still owe the money.

 

True story: a former colleague hired a tax firm to do her taxes – fill out forms and assess the amount owed. The firm underestimated the debt and overestimated the deductions. The IRS conducts random audits and contacted her one year – after she had left the paperwork to the firm for about five years in a row. Short version: the firm had done a lousy job. She wound up paying back taxes and fines of over $20,000. Yup. Four zeros. She appealed. She was allowed to pay it back over time, but she still owed all the back money. The firm did little to help her, citing that they based their figures on the information she gave them. Hmmm.

 

How long can you avoid filing taxes?
The powers-that-be have “six years to charge you with criminal tax evasion.” It can take as long as it likes to collect the money owed. Don’t forget, there’s interest charged on top of the penalties and money owed. Jail time is possible if they get you for criminal tax evasion. It’s a felony, folks. PLUS, you’ll probably get audited for years afterward.

 

What’s the difference between evasion and avoidance?

  • Tax evasion is fraud and means that you have used illegal ways to conceal income, with fines, penalties, and possible jail time (maybe five years) if found guilty. You lied on the forms. They can even charge you for the cost of prosecution.
  • Tax avoidance uses legal ways to reduce income with tax credits and allowable deductions.

WAIT!  What counts as under-reporting?
Not reporting cash ‘under the table’ for legal or illegal activities. Whether child-care or gun-running, income is income, according to the IRS.

Cryptocurrency transactions are taxable, so if you thought there were no rules, think again.

Whistleblowers:
There is a special IRS office that pays for information leading to the arrest (and conviction) of major tax fraud perpetrators. Big bucks are at stake if money is hidden in illegal overseas accounts. If it involves a criminal organization, witness protection might be part of what happens next.

 

My advice? Pay what you owe. There are legitimate tax planners out there who can possibly help reduce your tax bill, but to evade altogether? Seriously bad idea if you’re allergic to jail and big fines.

*information source: the IRS.

 

KN, p. 307 “St. Patrick’s Day Mischief”

Sure n’ begorra, we hear lots of stories about shenanigans on St. Patrick’s Day. And the night before. And the day after. And all weekend when the holiday falls on the weekend. That includes Fridays. In case you hadn’t looked at the calendar, St. Patrick’s Day falls on a Friday this year.

Pubs will be jammed and green beer will be flowing. Cops will be out and about, patrolling as precincts ask for all hands on deck while The Irish, and wannabe Irish folk all over the world celebrate. And drink. The amount of alcohol consumed that day is phenomenal. Guinness (beer company based in Dublin) reports that people in 150 countries drink about 13,000,000 pints worldwide on St. Patrick’s Day alone.

Listen closely to the people sloshing as they walk – or fall down.

That day, law enforcement has to deal with more than the usual traffic stops – drunk drivers get feisty when pulled over. If arrested, the ‘boozed up’ are likely to toss their cookies in the back seat of the patrol cars, and/or use that back seat as a bathroom. Yup. Not pleasant for anyone, and it’s the reason those back seats and floors are industrial strength vinyl, rather than cloth. Easier to wash out with a hose between arrests.

Some criminals get creative and dress up in costume on St. Patrick’s Day. Back in 2010, a bank in Tennessee was robbed by a guy dressed as a leprechaun. There was a car chase, a gunfight, and two dead bank robbers at the end of that ill-conceived day. The money was recovered.

One of the most famous crimes committed on St. Patrick’s Day was an art heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1990.

Impersonating Boston police, two men arrived at the museum, tied up the guards, and made off with 13 paintings valued at a half billion dollars. The paintings have never been recovered, but the heist has been the topic of several fictional versions of their whereabouts over the intervening 30+ years. I visited the Museum 15 years ago and saw the empty frames still hanging on the walls as placeholders. A sad reminder to the public of their loss.

A few responsible people do help when they see something tragic occur. In 2014, a drunken 22 year old decided to drive anyway. He hit and injured a woman and her boyfriend with his car. One of his friends in the car tried to get him to stay put after the accident, but he drove away. A cabbie witnessed the accident and followed the 22 y.o.’s car until he lost it in traffic. BUT, the cabbie called the police, shared the plate number, and the cops were waiting for the young man when he got home. He was arrested and pleaded guilty to second degree vehicular assault and leaving the scene of an incident without reporting it to police.

A garage roof collapsed and eight students were injured at an off-campus party in California attended by close to 1,000. They had been ‘brewfing,’ (sitting on a roof while drinking beer). Afterward, the town mayor decided to prohibit people being on a roof unless repairs were being done.

A man set himself on fire during a New Jersey St. Patrick’s Day pub crawl. In 2015, the police arrived at a pub to find a man on fire in the middle of the road. 25 bars in the area were on the pub crawl list. The officers put the fire out, so he was lucky and not seriously injured. The crawl never stopped, and by the end of the night, 11 people were arrested for drugs, assault, public drinking, and more…

Then there was the “Blarney Blowout” in 2014 near UMass in Amherst. Police in riot gear showed up for that one, trying to control thousands of drunken partiers. Some students threw beer bottles and cans at the cops. 52 arrests were made and people were injured on both sides of the melee.

In general, being drunk at a private party won’t get you arrested unless somebody gets hurt, or you wake the neighbors. But, what happens to you when you are arrested for drunk driving?

Penalties for DWI in North Carolina (similar in other States)

For a first offense, you will be required to pay a fine of up to $200 and stay in jail for at least 24 hours and up to 60 days. You will also lose your driver’s license for 30 days and be required to perform 24 hours of community service. You are taken straight to jail and your car is towed at your expense.

For a second offense, you will need to pay a fine of up to $500. You will have to stay in jail for at least 48 hours and may be required to stay for up to 120 days. You will also lose your driver’s license for 60 days and be required to perform 48 hours of community service.

For a third offense, you will pay a fine of up to $1,000. You will be required to serve a minimum jail sentence of 72 hours, but it could extend to six months. Additionally, you will lose your driver’s license for 90 days and be required to perform 72 hours of community service.

 Some offense info found at: https://www.schlosserandpritchettlaw.com/

 

Enjoy yourself on St. Patrick’s Day, but please stay safe and be mindful of the safety of others.

 

KN, p. 306 “Secrets of a Crime Writer”

 

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My little sister, Bridget, and I chat every few days. We trade stories and joke as we catch up on the stuff of life. She calls to pester me about coming to visit her in North Texas. I call her to make sure she’s staying out of trouble with the Sheriff and avoiding speeding tickets on 287 South.

This time she had me choking with laughter. She has been keeping a list of handy bits of information she swears that she picks up from Kerrian’s Notebook. This is what she shared tonight. Bridget’s guidelines are based on a few articles on the site, and I’ve included some links in bold so you can see what she read.

  • Hand guns are not a good choice for self-defense in the middle of the night if the gun is on a closet shelf in a locked box. I keep an axe next to the bed, so I will use my champion axe throwing skills to take out the bad guy.
  • Bodies in the basement tend to stink up the place. Good thing I don’t have a cellar. Not even a crawl space – in case some nefarious person is looking for a place to hide a body.
  • My phone is not safe from cloning or hacking in these days of cyber attacks, so I shouldn’t use it to pay for anything. That’s okay, since cash is accepted in most places, and I save a bunch on credit card fees.
  • I need to practice at the firing range so that I don’t shoot my foot.
  • Always remember to check the inside of a second-hand refrigerator I might buy, in case the seller stuffs a body inside it while I’m getting the truck ready.
  • Don’t look inside dumpsters at the mall. Ewwww.
  • Don’t travel by air during pollen season. The plane might not make it.
  • Don’t spend the night in jail. There are small spaces and other drawbacks.
  • Avoid having cups of tea in the houses of little old ladies.
  • Attend a writers’ conference. All that talk about murder and mayhem might be fun.


There ya have it. Handy tips from Bridget. Gotta love that sister of mine. Sheila and I just might be taking that road trip soon.

 

 

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