The Hoyt Fiasco: How Kevin "Laws Do Not Matter" Brown Tried to Destroy 4300 Victims of Crime

The IRS put me under unrelenting, often vicious attacks for 17 years. They never did provide a legitimate reason for my alleged "tax debts"; nothing that conforms to the law or the tax code, anyhow. No proof, just accusations based on statements that contradict the facts. Often, their statements would contradict each other.

Most amazingly, their entire "case" was proven facetious in federal court (the Bales case). IRS ignored the federal court decision and proceeded to treat 4300 victims, including me, as if nothing the court decided was true. So you win in court, and that doesn't stop them. But this was not about tax collection, so the facts didn't matter. More on that, momentarily.

And notice again the number of years. They have 3 years to assess and 10 to collect. Not the 17 they took. Lesson: Never trust the IRS with anything that requires math.

Crucial concept: They didn't just try to collect taxes due (not withstanding the fact there weren't any) and ridiculous amounts of interest and penalties on the fake "taxes due." They expended vast resources trying to destroy me. And they kept it up for 17 years. In counting up the IRS man-hours, I estimate close to $4.5 million they spent on their war against me. Just me.

They wasted prodigious resources in other government agencies by feeding those agencies patently false information; these agencies include the Secret Service, the FBI, my own state's tax agency, and my own local police department. People at each of these agencies eventually confirmed to me that IRS had conned them, and someone from each of these agencies apologized to me. IRS also caused enormously wasted resources among my business' suppliers and customers, my phone company, my mortgage company, my banks, and many others who had dealings with me.

These 17 years were during the prime of my life (age 37 to 54), when I should have been high-stepping my career and maximizing my earning power, saving up for retirement. Being on their list of people to destroy was somewhat like being in prison. I wasn't physically confined, but definitely I was confined socially, economically, and in other ways. To survive, I had to fight back; this took my energy away from more productive endeavors.

Also during those 17 years, they illegally obtained my phone records and contacted any woman I happened to be dating. They would fill her head with lies about me and then threaten her to stay silent. I know this because there was a pattern of sudden "it's over" silences, but one former GF confided in me what happened and she was very, very scared. She came to me because she believed she was already a target and that I could tell her how to protect herself. I could, and I did. And she escaped harm. As the war raged on, I stopped looking for a mate because this illegal war drained any resources I might allocate to a relationship anyhow. I reconciled myself to a high degree of social isolation.

The IRS violated several of my constitutionally protected rights. They did this often, and they did this egregiously. And they did it for 17 years, during which time our grossly overpaid misrepresentatives in CONgress did nothing about it even though there were 4300 other victims (more than died in the World Trade Center) of this same IRS crime spree also being attacked in similar and illegal ways. It was not a minor issue, by any measure.

How it emerged

In 1984, my (now ex) wife and I met with an EF Hutton rep at the EF Hutton offices to discuss oil and gas leasing partnerships offered by EF Hutton. Bottom line, we didn't have enough assets to participate.

In 1985, we found the Hoyt cattle opportunity which had the same "invest your tax dollars" angle to it. And, as with the oil and gas, it was not a "tax shelter" scam and a federal court ruled as much on the Hoyt operations in a case years later (ruling upheld by other courts, including appeals). Basically, you get tax breaks for business expenses and instead of getting your tax refund back you can have it invested into your share of the partnership. This does not improve your financial position until many years into the future, assuming things don't go bad with the business. Plus you have ongoing expenses and, because it's a real business, there are risks. It takes a patient investor to go this route.

My wife and I divorced in 1989, and the judge awarded me our interest in the Hoyt investment. Over the next few years, there were some tax filing adjustments at the partnership level and these resulted in assessments by the partnership to the partners. I paid these, because they were obligatory. But one was a bit hefty. So in 1993, I wrote to the IRS and asked if there was something dodgy going on with the Hoyt business that I needed to know about. They wrote back that they had examined the Hoyt entity and I had nothing to worry about. It was just normal business stuff, tax adjustments happen. IRS plainly stated that no personal tax liability would arise from this.

In 1998, only 5 years later, they had a very different position on this. And, as the old joke goes, that's when the fighting began.

IRS started bombarding me with threatening letters demanding sums of money that were, in total, more than 20 times the $53,000 I had invested in the Hoyt business and, of course, far more than the tax breaks I never actually received. Jay Hoyt had defrauded the investors and I lost every penny invested into that business. And there are more particulars that I won't go into, suffice it to say you'd want to ask how far can logic be twisted and does reality even matter at the IRS? Answer: Very far, and no it does not.

No basis

I wrote to the IRS, contesting their claims as having no basis in fact. Their reply was it was too late for me to contest anything. They "justified" this position by stating the matter had been decided in 1984. A year before I'd even heard of Hoyt. I told them that made no sense, because:

• A priori, their dates denying me due process violate the very concept of due process. Not to mention basic logic.
• If they had decided Hoyt was a criminal in 1984, how could they let him operate those 14 years with their certification as an IRS enrolled agent?
• If they had decided Hoyt was a criminal in 1984, how could they let him operate those 14 years with their certification as our Tax Matters Partner? In fact, they did not remove him as TMP until several years after my letter! And they did that only because of pressure from a federal court. The IRS manual requires them to remove a person as TMP for any of a list of reasons, and Hoyt qualified on every one of those reasons.
• If they had decided Hoyt was a criminal in 1984, how could they assure me 9 years later--in writing--they had examined the Hoyt entities and I would have no personal tax liability arising from this?

Very illegal, not isolated

So the whole thing was illegal. Very much so. That explains why the $103 million is still "missing" to this day. A big heist like that, you want to eliminate loose ends like Hoyt investors who got fleeced by your scheme. They might somehow get you investigated and you might end up with a slap on the wrist after you promise not to do it ever again.

Or maybe the IRS criminals felt there could be worse consequences, because at the time the courts had been piercing the corporate veil (big news in the legal industry) so maybe the government veil wasn't so far off? Indeed, several of Nixon's cohorts had gone to jail and some of Reagan's too. They could not 100% count on their IRS employee status to protect them. They had to systematically eliminate the victims of their fraud. And that is what this was about. I was one of the 4300 victims of this particular scam (there were actually other scams like this, such as AMCOR; IRS people were busy criminals), so they came after me.

Despite a litany of egregious criminal acts by these psychopaths, not one of them was ever indicted. The DOJ refused to even investigate, though it had a legal obligation to prosecute the criminals involved. I wrote to every member of Congress, and they did nothing. I visited some of them in person so many times, they and their staff knew me on sight. No action there, either. I wrote to President Clinton's office and then later to President Bush's office and then later to President Obama's office. No action there, either.

Hoyt was convicted on 52 counts of fraud, and died in prison. Yet when attacking the Hoyt victims individually and in court, IRS has always maintained there was no fraud. This makes sense for them, since IRS employees were obvious participants in conducting that fraud. But their position is akin to insisting gravity does not exist; Hoyt's fraud was well-established and beyond dispute.

Even beyond their ludicrous "fraud did not exist" position, IRS has taken contradictory positions in different court proceedings. This is something that any competent attorney will tell you litigants are not allowed to do. You can't argue the case one way and then in a future case argue the opposite. The first case sets the precedent. But IRS got away with doing this. When you're the IRS, you can threaten a judge into giving you the ruling you want. In the Hoyt Fiasco, they did this numerous times; we know this because some judges ignored (without comment in their ruling) rulings by other federal judges in the Hoyt case. This was most egregiously done in "Tax Court" where the judge ignored the ruling of the Hoyt Bankruptcy judge (that case generated 5 million pages of documents!), among other cases.

As a side note, recall that I was awarded the Hoyt investment in divorce court. This fact did not stop these criminals from stealing the assets of my (now ex) wife and those of her next husband and sending that couple into bankruptcy when they couldn't pay their other bills despite the fact both were working full-time and living in a financially responsible manner. What was the rationale there?

As another side note, armed thugs from IRS descended upon the home of the 13 year old granddaughter of one Hoyt investor for Hoyt-related taxes. But they also made it a criminal investigation by charging her with alleged back taxes she allegedly owed and for alleged wages she allegedly failed to report even though she was only 13 and could not possibly earn wages. One of the criminal charges was for failing to file; read the 1040 instructions and you will see why this is facetious at best.

Neither the child nor the parents had heard of Hoyt, but this did not deter the thugs from verbally abusing the girl, threatening her with a long prison sentence, and relentlessly grilling her while she sobbed in tears. What was the rationale there? Why are such people allowed to remain in society, much less on the federal payroll while carrying around federally issued firearms?

Some of the IRS illegal behavior toward me

• Due process repeatedly denied. This violates the 4th, 5th, and 14th Amendments.
   
• Threatened me and then blatantly took harsh actions against me because my business hosted the Hoyt Fiasco site (note that the information on the site was vetted by the TAO and several people in IRS Appeals for accuracy). This is but one example of how they violated my First Amendment rights.
   
• Threatened me if I would not stop contacting members of the Senate Finance Committee. The threats were pretty serious. I told them to go ahead and try; I think my refusal to be intimidated took them aback.
   
• Repeatedly threatened me with physical harm (over the phone). This was one particular agent. After taking this abuse for a while, I invited him to name a time and place to fight. He apparently had no idea I was a Kung Fu master; I was really looking forward to this. But my refusal to be intimidated apparently caused him to drop this line of threats.
   
• Called me at all hours, threatening me over the phone (not just the physical harm threats mentioned above). After being roused from bed a few times, I got in the habit of unplugging my phone before going to bed (and later setting the ringer to "Silent" mode, kicking in automatically at the time I set). But that didn't stop them from doing this during the day.
   
• Filed false reports with the local police, who then came to my home. After speaking with me, they realized they'd been conned by IRS. To comply with federal orders, they were supposed to search my home for firearms and confiscate them. Their solution was to simply take one firearm with them, telling me I could just pick it up at the police station the next day. This dog and pony show let them check off the box. I got zero hassle when I picked it up. This was clearly an attempted violation of Second Amendment rights by IRS, but that right was supported by good local cops.
   
• Filed false reports with IRS Criminal Division, which sent armed personnel to my home. They also saw they'd been conned. They apologized.
   
• Contacted any business I did business with and threatened them. This cost me several lucrative relationships I had already landed, severely constricting my ability to earn a living. Also, they did the same thing for personal relationships (no business element) they could track down.
   
• Sent massive stacks of forms to any business that had written a check to me (I was doing freelance writing on my SSN, a big mistake that I later corrected) and demanded they fill these out. One publisher called me and told me the stack was four inches thick. He also said it looked like they just filled a few envelopes with randomly selected forms as an intimidation tactic. Unfortunately, it worked; clients cancelled my writing gigs, which at the time constituted my main revenue source (and IRS knew that).
   
• Illegally seized tax refunds due me. This violates IRS procedures and Congressional mandate for effective tax administration. Remember the Bush stimulus checks to individuals? They took mine.
   
• Illegally raided my checking accounts. This violates IRS procedures and Congressional mandate for effective tax administration, plus 4th, 5th, and 15th Amendments.
   
• Forced the phone company to hand over my phone records. Then they harassed and/or intimidated people I had called. The idea was to get more information, such as the names of other people they knew I knew. It was an effort to destroy all of my personal friendships and business relationships. Yes, it was blatantly illegal but illegality does not matter to the IRS. It was morally repugnant too, but morals don't matter to the IRS either.
   
• Repeatedly reported to the local IRS office that I was a tax cheat and should be "randomly selected" for a tax audit. During this 17 years, I underwent more than three dozen audits--some going more than two decades past the audit limit. For 1995 alone, there were five audits. This, despite the statute that says you can be audited only once for a given tax year. Amazingly, two auditors took my side. We got along very well, I think of these two auditors as wonderful people despite the fact they work at IRS. One was a senior auditor with 31 years experience in the IRS audits division; IRS collections people did their own audits countermanding hers as if she were a mere novice. The reason was her audits showed large amounts due to me. Gee, when you follow the actual rules things sure do change.

How I survived

After a while, I caught on that I should refuse to provide IRS with any information beyond what I have to put on the 1040. I refused their demands for more, and I merely tossed the forms they sent me. I refused to respond to them in any way, as it could only hurt me. I realized they were always phishing for more information to use against me, regardless of any pretext of "settling" or that I might be treated better for complying with their demands.

By this point, I had an awesome tax attorney. She would tell them I was not going to comply, and they would tell her what they would do to me if I didn't. I would tell her to tell them to take their best shot. They would phone me, and I'd just hang up on them.

Because I honestly assessed the situation, I realized I had no legal protections. Not in America, a land with kangaroo courts and powerful agencies not bound by laws, scruples, ethics, or basic human decency. If you're a low-performing person who is morally bankrupt and you get hired into a job at one of these agencies, you can steal millions of dollars from thousands of people by using your job as a crime platform complete with federal immunity from any crimes you commit. That was the thinking behind the IRS psychopaths who created the Hoyt Fiasco and went into full terrorist mode against the 4300 victims of it.

Because the rule of law was completely absent from this situation, I adapted to the reality. I will not reveal what I did to adapt, as IRS will then figure out countermeasures for other victims. I would not do that to my fellow Americans. Suffice it to say my defense was powerful, and despite how much ammo they shot at me they failed to put me down.

They weren't even able to destroy my credit, something they think they can do to anybody and usually do with a devastating effect that is permanent. Six months after this 17 years of outright war against me ended, my FICO score stood at 809. But I am one of the very few of the 4300 to figure out how to effectively protect myself. Many of the other victims were utterly destroyed.

A huge contributor to this outcome for me is the fact I gained sympathetic "fifth column" allies inside the IRS. One wonderful human being is Tom Healy in Appeals (Sacramento). He was one of the few who could take visible, if limited, action without fear of repercussion. He helped me get this ended; if not for him it would never have ended because absent what Mr. Healy provided for me, the IRS can torture a Hoyt victim indefinitely until said victim dies (their actual goal with said victim).

Kevin Brown's acolytes managed to destroy almost any other IRS employee who tried to stand up to him (there are several proven examples). But a few decent folks with IRS jobs just waited for an opportunity to silently make things right to the extent they could. One kind soul involved in processing me out made sure my file didn't say anything about statutes expiring or some other "it's a technicality" thing. My file says the "debt was fully satisfied" and this is what went out to my county courthouse and the collection agencies and the credit bureaus. Not that there ever was any debt to begin with (there wasn't), but my record now shows I paid it in full.

Thanks to these unsung heroes who work in a malignant agency that should have been shut down a very long time ago. They took big risks for me, and I appreciate that. I hope karma is there for them, and they find their kindness rewarded if they ever are in a bad situation.

We are not much different from you. The difference is that we are victims of a $103 million fraud conducted by IRS employees for their own personal gain.

This particular crime spree conducted by Kevin Brown and other rogue IRS employees was followed by even more crime to silence the victims. The costly and illegal abuses ordered by (now former) IRS executive Kevin Brown were so outrageous and morally offensive that his lead prosecutor quit in disgust.

Kevin Brown later followed in the footsteps of his disgraced former boss Mark Everson, after Everson was forced out of the top spot at the Red Cross in a sex scandal. We are not talking about nice people, here. Brown left the Red Cross after an undistinguished and short career there and for reasons that weren't disclosed.

We can't stress enough the fact this has nothing to do with tax collection or funding the government. It's all about hiding the fraud committed by Kevin Brown and cohorts. In fact, the IRS is sloppy about enforcing the tax code in any way that makes any sense.

Kevin Brown proved, with tragic consequences and wide-spread devastation, that the IRS does not provide adequate oversight of its employees. In fact, Brown epitomizes the culture of crime that pervades the IRS. The GAO reported that IRS employees stole 4300 computers from their own offices in a single year. Small wonder this happens, with psychopaths like Kevin Brown holding very senior positions and doing what he did (human carnage, financial looting, intimidating subordinates to egregiously break the law, etc.).

We had hoped, as we learned the truth of Brown's complicity in this fiasco, that IRS employees would do the right thing and turn Brown in. That never happened. We had also hoped the IRS employees involved in this fiasco would follow the law, rather than follow Brown. In a few rare cases, that did happen. But it did not save the victims from the many illegal and personally devastating acts committed against them by law-scoffing IRS employees.

When we were able to get a response from the (relatively few) law-abiding employees inside the IRS, they were "mysteriously" made unavailable after they began investigating. We were told they were "transferred."

The Hoyt tragedy, which has dragged on illegally for over three decades, is not an anomaly. This kind of misconduct occurs because the IRS has far too much power and almost zero accountability. That needs to change.

Watch this video. Help stop the terrorism; contact your senator and each of your Congressional reps today. Send them this video and ask them why they tolerate this in what is alleged to be a civil society.

Referring to the Tax Code is also pointless. IRS simply disregarded it, making up a special "code" of their own to destroy the Kevin Brown victims with.

It's well documented, BY THE IRS, that the Hoyt Fiasco victims did nothing wrong. Many paid the ultimate price, despite being innocent. Yet, Geithner and Rangel (a tax cheat and a tax cheat who committed criminal offenses respectively) both got a free pass.

• 10PointChecklistForPeopleWithIRS-Problems
• IRS Attorney Statement
• Lobbyist Statement
• Myth vs. Truth
• Outline for Legislators
• Traffic stats
• Welcome to Legislators
• More About Who We Are

• Assistance resources
• Geithner Song
• Legislator contact info.
• Lien Removal
• PDFT
• Reference Documents
• Sample letter you can write
• TAO contact info
• TMP Factoid
• Writing for help

• Read this and ask, "Why are Hoyt victims saddled with interest and penalties?":
  2009-02TheWeekIRSAbatesInterestAndPenaltiesForTopDogs.pdf
• Here's an example of an agency that is not held accountable for idiotic and wasteful behavior:
  IRS Collections Attack On Zeff TheWeek2010-03-12.
  

The documents below may prove useful in your own situation in talking with the IRS, or when writing to legislators to make them aware of how your particular case yet another example of abuse from the IRS. It's a good idea to read these and make yourself familiar with the principles involved. If you want to explore a referenced court case further, you can find information at your local law library.

Do not ask the PDFT attorneys about these documents or about these cases. If you wish to use them in a legal effort, please refer to your individual attorney.

• WSJ-2003-02-12-CowValuations. This shows the fraud that Jay Hoyt committed against his partners (see the related IRS coverup document, IRS-86-FlowThroughOK).
• 2002-04-08WSJ. Article that show how capricious Congress is about the role of the IRS.
• 2002-01-07WSJ-CourtCases. IRS lost one court battle after another.
• 2002-01-09WSJ. It's very hard to work with the IRS and reach a reasonable settlement.
   
• Application for Reward. Form 211, to report IRS employees who participated in the fraud.
• Biven Brief 2002. The original "big case" in the Hoyt Fiasco.
• Department of Justice Dumb Response. This is the kind of help we get? Isn't the DOJ supposed to enforce the laws, rather than aid in breaking them?
• Expert Advice No Penalties TaxShelter TaxHotline 2008May. Tax Court ruled that penalties do not apply when people act on expert advice before investing in a business that has tax advantages (very similar to Hoyt Fiasco, in which IRS refuses to reduce or eliminate penalties).
   
• Innocent Spouse2002-10-05. The marriages of many Hoyt investors were destroyed by malicious (and often illegal) IRS actions. Those who remarried found their new spouses soon under attack also.
• Innocent Spouse2002-10-05-Direct From Screen. A variation of the above.
   
• IRS-86-FlowThroughOK. IRS assured a taxpayer, in writing, that the Hoyt investment was fine and no personal income tax increase would arise from it. Later, IRS sent that same taxpayer a bill for over a quarter million dollars.
   
• IRS Committed Fraud Appeals Court Ruled. Just one of many examples of fraud conducted by the IRS. Sometimes, they actually don't get away with it.
• IRS Delay Means No Dice. The Hoyt victims are subject to an entirely different "tax code" (one made up just for us), case precedent, laws, and so forth. Where a law or case applies to everyone else, for some reason it doesn't apply to the Hoyt victims. Here's an example.
   
• IRS Pays For Document That Didn't Exist. IRS failure to produce gets taxpayer off hook. It seems that nothing but death gets Hoyt victims off the hook.
• IRS Neglect Not Excusable TaxHotline2008-03. The court declared IRS to be a "sophisticated creditor" and didn't allow IRS to claim its employees' negligence justifies abusing a particular taxpayer. In the Hoyt Fiasco, IRS successfully relied on negligence  to justify overly aggressive actions against the very victims of IRS negligence (IRS also claimed ignorance and incompetence). One set of (harsh) rules for Hoyt victims, another set for everyone else....
   
• Must Assess Individual. The IRS claimed it assessed individuals by assessing the partnerships, but such a claim is without merit.
• Partners Not Liable. The Hoyt investors were a partners, with Jay Hoyt the managing partner who controlled everything. The IRS gave Hoyt a free pass, but then viciously attacked people who were not even liable.
• Partners Not Liable-2. More evidence of the preceding point.
• Person With No Authority Not Liable. Jay Hoyt controlled everything, leaving the Hoyt investors with no authority. That means none of them are liable, yet Kevin Brown, a high-ranking manager at the IRS national office, illegally asserts they are. And what Kevin Brown wants, he apparently gets. Regardless of the law, the facts, or the ethics involved.
   
• Tax Liens Do Not Help. As common sense would predict, and the Taxpayer Advocate Office has finally asserted, Tax Liens provide a negative financial impact to the government. The reason is what the massive, often irreversible, damage they do to the taxpayer. You cannot get eggs from a dead chicken.
• Taxpayer Advocacy Panel, a citizen's suggestions. Use as basis for your own letters.
• TMP Conflict Of Interest. Hoyt was the TMP who sold the Hoyt investors down the river, though he had no authority to sign anything. The IRS managed to get around this problem, just as they've managed to ignore other laws and regulations.
   

Here are some philosophically-related documents. If the government is so desperate for money, why not cut back on regulations instead of focus on wiping out innocent victims of a scam abetted by federal employees?

• CostOfRegulationsTheWeek2008-01.pdf. Want to save a billion dollars, which can then be taxed at 30%? No problem. Just reduce the thousands of pointless regulations that afflict businesses. By eliminating regulations, Congress could have the benefits of a tax increase without the pain of one.
   
• Cost of federal income tax system. This doesn't include actual taxes--just the cost of the system. If sending to a legislator, you may want to point out the tremendous waste of resources being used to crush the victims of the Hoyt Fiasco. Note: the federal income tax is just one of many federal taxes and not nearly the largest one that the typical citizen pays. Of course, for Hoyt victims, it's not 15% or 25% of income--it's a theft tax (not passed by Congress) that amounts to 20 thousand percent or more of the victim's wages.

Kevin Brown so aggressively drove the IRS machinery against the Hoyt victims that his lead attorney quit in disgust. This had absolutely nothing to do with "collecting taxes" or "funding the government," because Brown's storm troopers spent far more government money attacking the Hoyt victims than could ever be collected from them. In some cases, individual victims were singled out for abuse and the IRS spent more on each person than that person could earn in a lifetime.

Once the victims were devastated and thus no longer a potential threat, Brown left the IRS (which, incidentally, never recovered the missing $103 million). First Brown followed his former boss to the scandal-plagued Red Cross and then left there as well....

Covering up a robbery. The Hoyt victims were robbed by IRS employees colluding with Jay Hoyt over many years. Is this why Kevin Brown took it upon himself to come up with a special tax on theft--even though nowhere in the income tax code does any such thing exist even in theory--and stick that to the Hoyt victims?

Brown's special illegal tax law works similar to: someone robs your house and you have to pay taxes on what they took. That's the essence of Brown's creative and illegal legislating.

Brown's misconduct ensured that due process was eliminated and the all timelines expired before victims could do anything other than be on the hook. Brown and his minions not only failed to notify potential victims but lied to them in writing when they inquired. Writing that "You will have no personal tax liability" is not, contrary to Brown's later assertions in the Kangaroo Tax Court, the same as notifying someone they owe a tax.

Thanks to Brown's lies, deceptions, and abuse of power, the IRS is still aggressively attacking people whose only "crime" was to believe what the IRS told them--in writing. But they let the tax cheats below get away with obvious tax cheating. Why the double standard?

The IRS has done nothing about these actual tax cheats:

• Timothy Geithner blatantly cheated on his taxes for several years, but after getting caught he claimed he made an honest mistake. The IRS let him off with no penalties or interest. Meanwhile, the IRS behavior toward the Hoyt victims has been downright brutal and well outside what any sane person would consider "civilized." The Hoyt victims didn't cheat on their taxes; but they did follow written instructions from, and believe written assurances from, the IRS. Watch this video: Geithner Song

• Bill Clinton deducted $4 a pair for used underpants he "donated" to charity (as if anybody would want to wear them). The IRS turned a blind eye to this obvious tax cheating--and to a long list of other obviously inflated "donations" of trash the Clintons made to charity. Try deducting $80 for a worn-out pair of shoes on your tax return.

• Congressman Chuck Rangel is Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, which essentially writes the tax code. He cheated on his taxes, then claimed he "didn't know" it was illegal to hide income from the IRS via offshore accounts. The IRS lets him off with no penalties or interest. And Rangel, who should be serving 30 years in prison for tax evasion, is still Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.

• Ted Kennedy hid millions of dollars offshore for decades. The IRS never investigated this. The Kennedy clan, in fact, ran many tax scams that the IRS knew about and still does. Apparently, tax cheating is fine with the IRS. It's when you do nothing wrong that they try to bury you.

Can we count on help from the DOJ? Hardly. O.J. Simpson committed a brutal double homicide, yet the government let him walk away. Meanwhile, people whose only "crime" was to trust IRS employees' written assurances are being systematically destroyed. Why the double standard? After you read this dumb response from the DOJ, you'll wonder if aliens could ever find any sign of intelligent life there.

Well, maybe our Defense Department will defend thousands of innocent Americans against brutal attacks? Wrong again. The number of victims of the Hoyt Fiasco exceeds the number of victims of all three attacks on the World Trade Center combined (1992 and 2001). In both cases, the attacks caused innocent people to die. Congress has done nothing for the 4300 Hoyt victims across America, but for an attack on fewer Americans in just one city--the entire nation went to war.

The IRS is using tactics one of their own attorneys publicly stated were unethical and morally indefensible (as reported in the Augusta Chronicle). That statement came out before the trial in which IRS people suppressed material evidence and repeatedly claimed "I can't remember" instead of answering questions on the witness stand.

Devastation

How can anyone justify devastating thousands of innocent people who relied on the written promises of government officials? The costs to the remaining victims continue to mount, as government employees continue to misappropriate IRS resources and violate Congressional mandates in their zeal to destroy the victims.

Consider these victim statements:

"Jay Hoyt defrauded me of $50,000 over 11 years (roughly twice my average annual wages during that time), until 1995. IRS calls this 'tax sheltering' and now wants all of my assets and nearly all my income for the next 10 years. Figure that one out."

"I ran the numbers. If I can somehow charm someone into loaning me the money to pay what I allegedly owe, it will take me 233 years to pay back the loan--and doing that means living below the poverty line the whole time."

Imagine being bilked of your retirement savings, with the help of people working for a federal agency. Imagine that those people provided you written assurances that your suspicions of wrong-doing were incorrect--that they had examined things and you had nothing to worry about.

Now imagine--after you discover that, yes, you had been defrauded after all, these same people create a "theft tax" and hit you with tax bills that would stagger someone earning ten times what you make.

Denying you due process, they threaten you with prison if you don't fork over absurdly large amounts of money--more than you could earn in a lifetime. And they do this even though nowhere in the Tax Code is there any such thing as a "theft tax" (tip: it's called an "income tax").

If you think that can't happen to innocent American citizens, think again.

Welcome to the Hoyt Fiasco.

Why?

• Why are these people going to such extremes to silence the victims?

• What are they trying to hide?

• Why is over $103 million "missing?"

• How do IRS employees justify spending far more on devastating the victims than they can possibly ever collect from them? This isn't helping the government--so why are they doing it?

• Contact federal law enforcement officials, your senators, your Congressman, members of the Senate Finance Committee, the Treasury Inspector, and others who should object to this inexcusable misconduct and ask them why Brown and his cohorts got away with it.
   
• Report any abuse to as many people as possible.
   
• Contribute to stopping future abuses by reminding legislators the whole 1040 tax system brings in less than it costs the economy (due to economic drag, compliance costs, and abuses like this). Simply abolishing the IRS outright is easy; let the 50 states use existing state tax collection methods to pay a tax by apportion and submit to a small office overseeing that. Existing IRS employees could be retasked to some function that's actually useful, with no more Kevin Browns being inflicted on law-abiding citizens.

We are trying to remain unbiased. Despite the situation inflicted on us, we have tried to cooperate with the IRS. While they have made statements we have proven wrong, we have made every effort to present the facts as we know them and not to distort things just to further our agenda. In fact, we have asked IRS officials to let us know if any information on this site is inaccurate.

We are not anti-IRS. We aren't on some mission to make the IRS look bad (we can't possibly do that as well as they do already). We are thankful for good people in the IRS who oppose the inexcusable way other folks in the IRS are handling this fiasco and mistreating the Hoyt victims. Unfortunately, the good people do not seem to be the ones in charge. And why hasn't Congress put a stop to this blatant abuse? Have members of Congress forgotten that "representative" means something?

Why the unethical treatment of the Hoyt Victims? And where's the "missing" $103 million?

We are not tax protestors. We are not trying to protest taxes or shirk our duties as citizens. We are not part of any tax protest group, nor are we one ourselves. We seek to thwart specific abuse, conducted by people in the IRS. This outrageous violation of the public trust has already cost the taxpayers far too much. Worse, it has taken the lives of several victims and ruined the lives of hundreds more. How many more innocent American citizens will be unlawfully stripped of their property or even their very lives, before we can resolve this in an intelligent, lawful, and equitable manner?

Some links you may find interesting:

• 7 Questions
• 10PointChecklistForPeopleWithIRS-Problems
• 23 Facts
• Abatement Proposal
• Abusive Tax Shelter--No
• Amicus Brief
• Biven Suit Update
• CA passes law for relief of Hoyt victims
• Evidence
• Letters
• More than allegation
• Number partners by state
• Page View Stats
• Phantom Cow: last issue
• Senate Finance Committee
• Settlement Information
• Site Support and Funding
• Sordid Saga
• Synopsis
• Timeline
• Traffic stats
• Transpac