Posted on 01/08/2004 5:56:20 AM PST by sinkspur
FORT WORTH - After deliberating for more than 13 hours over two days, a federal jury Wednesday convicted Bedford businessman and tax protester Richard Simkanin on 29 counts of violating U.S. income tax laws.
The jury of six men and six women delivered its verdict shortly after 8 p.m. They remained deadlocked on two counts within the indictment, leading U.S. District Judge John McBryde to declare a mistrial on those charges.
Simkanin stood silently with his hands behind his back, showing no emotion, as a court clerk read the 29 guilty verdicts. Some supporters in the courtroom dabbed their eyes; others glared at the judge.
Simkanin, 59, is scheduled to be sentenced April 30, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Jarvis said. He can get up to five years on each of the 25 felony counts and up to a year on each of the four misdemeanor charges.
"Justice was served, and we're pleased that the jury understood that no one is above the law," Jarvis said.
Arch McColl, the Dallas lawyer representing Simkanin, said his client was denied a fair trial because McBryde did not allow him to present key evidence on whether Social Security, Medicare and income taxes are voluntary.
McColl said he expects to win on appeal, but he added that it is time for Americans to pay attention to what happened in court.
"I'm terribly disappointed," McColl said. "It was not a fair trial in accordance with the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution that includes the fundamental right to present evidence on your own behalf."
Robert Schulz, founder of We the People Foundation for Constitutional Education, a group that questions the validity of the nation's tax laws, told Simkanin's supporters that the defendant was prepared for the worst.
"His spirits are fine. His faith is strong," Schulz said.
This is the second time Simkanin has gone on trial. In November, McBryde declared a mistrial when jurors who deliberated for eight hours said that they were deadlocked and could not reach a unanimous verdict.
Simkanin is almost considered to be a political prisoner by groups that question the validity of the nation's tax laws. They contend that most Americans are not required to pay income taxes.
They are particularly hostile toward the Internal Revenue Service, an agency that, they say, is not an official government entity.
Simkanin's supporters came from around the country. They held a vigil at the courthouse, at one time praying in the hallway. They often gave him a thumbs-up gesture as he entered the courtroom. Once, Simkanin got a standing ovation.
During the trial, Simkanin testified that he didn't withhold employees' taxes for Medicare and Social Security benefits because his research did not produce a law showing that participation in the programs was mandatory.
But Simkanin backed away from some of his anti-government comments, saying they were a mistake. He once wrote to the U.S. Treasury secretary saying that he had repatriated himself from the United States to the "Republic of Texas."
When McColl tried to query witnesses on legal definitions of "employee" and "wages," McBryde cut him off. The judge told jurors they could not question the constitutionality of the tax code.
Prosecutors put 11 witnesses on the stand to show that Simkanin knew what he was doing when he stopped withholding and paying taxes. Under federal tax laws, ignorance of tax codes can be used as a legal defense.
Jurors sent out seven notes during their 11 hours of deliberations Wednesday.
They asked for legal definitions and whether they had to review evidence on who does have to pay taxes.
McColl said his client's company, Arrow Custom Plastics, is in deep financial trouble because of his fights with the government. Simkanin has been in jail since June.
Simkanin was convicted on 10 felony counts of failing to withhold about $139,000 in taxes from employees' wages and 15 felony counts of filing false tax refund claims for about $235,000.
He also was found guilty of four misdemeanor counts of not filing individual income tax returns from 1998 to 2001. Simkanin had an estimated gross income of about $410,000 during those years, according to the indictment.
Dottie Harrison, a Simkanin supporter from Houston, said his allies will continue to fight.
"I'm in shock, but the determined energy everyone feels to overturn this injustice will be a catalyst that will expose the entire IRS fraud," she said.
Hey, good luck with your hobby political party. It probably doubles each time someone joins it!
Another tactic by the tax protesters is to maintain that if every single process used to carry out constitutional laws is not spelled out in the Constitution, then that process is unconstitutional.
Congress passed withholding under Roosevelt (I forget the year), and withholding has been upheld by the USSC.
You're not reasoning; you're stamping your feet.
The IRS was under no obligation, and the judge ruled such, to fall for the defense tactic of putting the law on trial.
If you don't like the law, change the law.
I should hast saith "dost thou".
"...it is the province of the jury, on questions of law it is the province of the court, to decide. But it must be observed, that...you have, nevertheless, a right to take upon yourselves to judge of both, and to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy. On this, and on every other occasion, however, we have no doubt, you will pay that respect which is due to the opinion of the court: for as, on the one hand, it is presumed, that juries are the best judges of facts; it is, on the other hand, presumable, that the court are the best judges of law. But still, both objects are lawfully within your power of decision."Chief Justive John Jay charging the jury in Georgia v. Brailsford, 3 Dall 1 (1794)
Sounds like you got srewed first by the ex-wife, the rest just had sloppy-seconds.
Divorce and child-custody hearings now account for more than 50% of most state Court Dockets. Irrational parents, spurned lovers, and their sleazy, second-rate lawyers drive the system. Frankly, I have always thought that people who can't settle the divorce and distribution out of Court, should pay a divorce tax for bogging down our courts with their own poor decisions and personal misery.
As I recently told one friend who was going to marry someone who had been married once before for only 4 months. Every divorce is both people's fault. She took offense and defended her man by saying how evil, corrupt, manipulating, and unfaithful the former spouse was. I quickly pointed out, that if nothing else, her husband to be was a fool for not knowing that!
The judge refused to even allow such inquiry in the most recent court matter, and in the previous trial, the IRS agents refused to testify as to te existence, if any, of such a law.
That is the biggest single problem here; the Court denying a defendant the right to explore whether the law he is accused of breaking even exists.
Diverting the focus from the actual problem to the straw man of a jury's right to decide the constitutionality of a law only disacts from the hitherto unanswered question:
Does this alleged but unsubstantiated law even exist? And if it does, why does the IRS refuse to cite it in open court?
Let's drop the hot dog bun and chew on the steak, n'kay Sinky?
;-/
Be careful what you wish for.
It's time for a federal sales tax. Pure and simple. Get rid of the "code" and the IRS and let congress spend with constraint.
I wonder if his employees, who were exposed to legal liability by him, would feel the same way?
Every crook feels like he's been railroaded; "the system" did him in.
Please. I'm surprised you don't resent tax cheats who, in effect, are making YOU pay higher taxes. Instead, you laud him as a hero.
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