Court Opinion

ID: 9467086
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:38:02.995178+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:09.078559
License: Public Domain

ORDER DENYING PETITION FOR REHEARING EN BANC
The petition for rehearing en banc in the above entitled case is denied.
Lay, Chief Judge, joined by Heaney, Circuit Judge, would grant the petition for rehearing en banc for the following reasons:
We respectfully dissent from the denial of the petition for rehearing en banc in the above entitled case.
In Garner v. United States, 424 U.S. 648, 96 S.Ct. 1178, 47 L.Ed.2d 370 (1976), the Supreme Court stated that a defendant could not properly be convicted under 26 U.S.C. § 7203 for an erroneous claim of fifth amendment privilege asserted in good faith. Id. at 663 n. 18, 96 S.Ct. at 1187. An assertion of the fifth amendment privilege may negate the element of willfulness required for conviction under section 7203. United States v. Edelson, 604 F.2d 232, 234-36 (3d Cir. 1979). The panel recognized these principles, at and stated that the district court “could have more precisely spelled out the relationship between willfulness as an element of the offense and assertion of a fifth amendment defense . . .” Id. at 572-573. The problem with the district court’s instructions is not merely imprecision, but is that the district court failed to relate the assertion of fifth amendment privilege to the element of willfulness. Under the instructions given, see id. at 573-574, the jury could have convicted the defendant for willful failure to file a return and yet believed that his assertion of fifth amendment privilege was in good faith. Garner would not admit such an inconsistent result. 424 U.S. at 663, 96 S.Ct. at 1187. An incorrect statement of the defendant’s sole defense given to the jury by the instructions is plain error, requiring a reversal to assure the defendant a fair trial and a chance to present his defense. Cross v. United States, 347 F.2d 327, 330 (8th Cir. 1965).
The defense of a “good faith” assertion of fifth amendment privilege should be presented to and rejected by a jury before it convicts a defendant under section 7203, see Edelson, 604 F.2d at 236; United States v. Foster, No. 76-3733, slip op. at 3 (9th Cir., Dec. 30, 1977), except in one circumstance. The Supreme Court in United States v. Sullivan, 274 U.S. 259, 47 S.Ct. 607, 71 L.Ed. 1037 (1927) held that the fifth amendment does not protect a taxpayer from prosecution for willfully refusing to make any return under the federal income tax laws. Id. at 263, 47 S.Ct. at 607. On page eight of its opinion, the panel refers to three circuit court opinions which hold that a claim of fifth amendment privilege is not a defense to a section 7203 prosecution where the defendant’s return does not contain any financial information. United States v. Daly, 481 F.2d 28, 29 (8th Cir. *5751973); United States v. Johnson, 577 F.2d 1304, 1311 (5th Cir. 1978); United States v. Irwin, 561 F.2d 198, 200 (10th Cir. 1977). The panel’s opinion does not hold that the defendant’s return contained no financial information. See Farber, at 571 n. 2. Rather, the panel stated that “the taxpayer provided the IRS with insufficient information to calculate tax liability.” Id. at 8. It is unclear whether the panel equated insufficient information with no information and, for that reason, determined that the issue of the good faith of the assertion of fifth amendment privilege need not be placed before the jury. If the panel determined that the financial information on defendant’s return was so minimal as to be “tantamount to no filing at all,” United States v. Brown, 600 F.2d 248, 251 (10th Cir. 1979), the panel should have held that there was no need to place the fifth amendment defense before the jury. In Brown the Tenth Circuit held that a tax protestor’s return claiming $22.50 income was no return at all. Id. at 251-252. In the present ease I would hold that a tax protestor’s return claiming less than $100 income was no return at all and it was not error for the court to refuse to instruct the jury on the defense of good faith.