Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-92-06319/USCOURTS-ca10-92-06319-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
John R. Gassei
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

F IL .LA D l 

United Stilt.es Co~rt ~! Appea f TrntJ, ('.ir~,.h 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

MAR 3 0 1993 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. 

JOHN R. GASSEI, 

Defendant-Appellant. 

No . 92-6319 

(D.C . No. CR-92-38-W) 

(W.D. Oklahoma) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Submitted on the Briefs: 

Before LOGAN, MOORE, and BRORBY, Circuit Judges . 

John Gassei was convicted of attempting to evade or defeat 

the payment of income tax for the years 1985, 1986, and 1987. He 

was sentenced to three concurrent terms of seven months and to a 

three-year term of supervised release. As a special condition of 

that release, the court required Mr. Gassei to file income tax 

returns for the three years relating to his conviction as well as 

*This order and judgment has no precedential value and shall not 

be cited, or used by any court within the Tenth Circuit, except 

for purposes of establishing the doctrines of the law of the case, 

res judicata, or collateral estoppel. 10th Cir. R. 36.3. 

Appellate Case: 92-6319 Document: 010110199093 Date Filed: 03/30/1993 Page: 1 
for the ensuing three years. He now appeals the special 

condition, arguing the requirement he file returns for years other 

than those relating to his conviction violates his Fifth Amendment 

privilege against self-incrimination. Long established principles 

lead us to disagree, and we affirm. 

The only issue in this appeal is whether the district court 

violated defendant's right not to incriminate himself by requiring 

he file income tax returns for the years 1988, 1989, and 1990. 

Conceding the district court has discretion to fashion conditions 

of release, he contends: "requiring an individual to file returns 

for tax years subsequent to the years of conviction requires the 

individual to incriminate himself." 

Mr. Gassei does not explain how the mere filing of the return 

will incriminate him. For example, he does not assert his income 

came from illegal sources, nor does he identify any particular 

information required by an income tax return that might tend to 

incriminate him. In virtually shibbolethic tax resister cant, he 

simpl y argues he cannot be compelled to disclose his income 

without violation of the Fifth Amendment. 

This argument has been defunct for decades. In United States 

v. Sullivan, 274 U.S. 259, 263-64 (1927 ) , Justice Holmes said: 

In the decision that [the requirement to file a return] 

was contrary to the Constitution we are of opinion [sic] 

that the protection of the Fifth Amendment was pressed 

too far. If the form of return provided called for 

answers that the defendant was privileged from making he 

could have raised the objection in the return, but could 

not on that account refuse to make any return at all .. . . It would be an extreme if not an extravagant 

application of the Fifth Amendment to say that it 

authorized a man to refuse to state the amount of his 

income because it had been made in crime. But if the 

defendant desired to test that or any other point he 

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Appellate Case: 92-6319 Document: 010110199093 Date Filed: 03/30/1993 Page: 2 
should have tested it in the return so that it could be 

passed upon. He could not draw a conjurer's circle 

around the whole matter by his own declaration that to 

write any word upon the government blank would bring him 

into danger of the law. 

The Fifth Circuit, in United States v. Johnson, 577 F.2d 

1304, 1310 (5th Cir. 1978 ) said: 

Johnson errs in his interpretation of his rights 

under the Fifth Amendment in the context of the income 

tax laws. He contends that his privilege against self- incrimination permits him to "stand mute" and refuse to 

cooperate at all in the determination of his tax 

liability. He argues that he has a privilege, under the 

Fifth Amendment, to refuse to disclose any income 

information since he claims that some of his income was 

derived from illegal activities. Under wellestablished precedents, Johnson is wrong in these 

contentions. 

(empahsis in original). Similarly, we have held, "it is an 

illegal effort to stretch the Fifth Amendment to include a 

taxpayer who wishes to avoid filing a return," United States v. 

Brown, 600 F.2d 248, 252 (10th Cir. ) , cert. denied, 444 U.S. 917 

(1979 ) , and "[t]he filing of federal income tax information does 

not violate Fifth Amendment rights, inasmuch as such information 

is offered in a non-accusatorial setting." 

States, 500 F.2d 1369, 1370 (10th Cir. 1974). 

Pauldino v. United 

We believe defendant's argument that he has a blanket right 

to refuse to file which is protected by the Fifth Amendment is 

wholly unfounded. Because that was his only objection to the 

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imposition of the special condition of supervised release, we 

conclude the district court did not err. 

AFFIRMED. 

Entered for the Court 

John P. Moore 

Circuit Judge 

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