Court Opinion

ID: 9490670
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:51:26.229901+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:54:15.225519
License: Public Domain

STAPLETON, J.,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I am persuaded that there is a basis for estopping the Commissioner in this case. As the court persuasively observes, the Service must have learned that it had the taxpayer’s Form 872-A at some point prior to June 30, 1984, and, based on the Form 872s then in the taxpayer’s file, must have realized that he expected the Commissioner’s ability to assess a deficiency to terminate on that date.
I am not persuaded, however, that the Commissioner should be estopped from contending that any deficiency and interest is due. The only specific reliance the taxpayer claims in this case is his forbearance from revoking his Form 872-A. He insists that, had the Service informed him that it had his Form 872-A in 1984, he would have promptly exercised his right to revoke his indefinite waiver of the limitations period. If he had done so, however, the Service would have had 90 days to assess a deficiency, and the record indicates that it clearly would have done so to protect its position even though its investigation was not complete.1 Thus, if the taxpayer had not been misled by the Service, he would have had to pay in the Fall of 1984 the deficiency found by the Tax Court to be due, with statutory interest up to that time.
Equitable estoppel is an equitable defense and should be tailored to fit the equities of the particular ease. Green v. Interstate United Management Services Corp., 748 F.2d 827, 830 (3d Cir.1984) (“[T]he equitable doctrine of estoppel [is] ‘a flexible doctrine, to be applied ... as the equities between the parties preponderate.’ ”); Dobbs, Law of *454Remedies, §§ 2.3(5) and 2.4(1). Estopping the Commissioner from contending that any of the deficiency and interest he has assessed is due will result in an unnecessary windfall to the taxpayer. In order to avoid such a windfall, I would hold that the Commissioner is estopped from contending that any amount is due in excess of the deficiency found by the Tax Court, statutory interest up until September 30,1984, and market rate interest from that date until payment.

. In each of the three earlier instances in which the Service asked the taxpayer to execute a one-year extension, it advised him that a failure to grant an extension would cause it to immediately assess a deficiency.