Posted on 04/06/2013 2:31:04 AM PDT by dennisw
After nearly three years in prison, Wesley Snipes is almost free man.
The Blade star was released this week from a Pennsylvania prison and transferred to house arrest after being admitted in 2010 on charges of federal tax evasion.
According to TMZ, the 50-year-old actor left the McKean Federal Corrections on Tuesday, several months shy of his 36 month sentence.
Snipes is no longer listed as an inmate at the rural facility, and is now listed on the website of the Federal Bureau of Prisons as being under the watchful eye of the New York Communty Corrections Office.
Officers will keep a watchful eye on the actor as he finishes out his sentence under home confinement, which the FBP lists as July 19.
His release is -- ironically -- just two weeks before tax day.
The Passenger 57 actor was found guilty of not paying as much as $15million in dividends to the government for his earnings from 1999 to 2001.
His lawyers argued that his tax advisers, Douglas P. Rosile and Eddie Ray Kahn, who were also jailed, had duped their client with a claim that there were no laws requiring him to pay tax.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
“several months shy of his 36 month sentence”, which sort of contradicts the headline “after serving three years”. Sort of like John Kerry saying he completed a full tour except for the last 9 months of it. Due to a scratch on his finger, of course. I’m not trying to diminish his valuable service.
Well, I wish him the best of luck. He did his time. Hopefully, he will get better tax advisers in the future. He will probably be back in the big money again in no time. Lessons learned all around, I suppose.
And the ADL/SPLC were central in hunting him down, as they claimed him to be a “far-right extremist” connected to sovereign citizens groups. Pitcavage was drooling all over himself.
Disgusting.
being under the watchful eye of the New York Communty Corrections Office. Officers
Watchful eye???? ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.
He didn’t think there were laws about him paying taxes on millions of dollars? Not very bright, is he? Hopefully he’s smarter now.
Ignorance of the law is no excuse but its not tax evasion when you rely in good faith on what your tax preparers to tell you, concernin any tax you might owe.
With the tax code so complicated, I doubt the federal prosecutors who put Snipes in prison could tell a jury they know exactly how much they owe. So why single him out? Its not Snipes who was guilty, its our tax system.
Its arbitrary, capricious and completely incomprehensible even to well-trained tax preparers, accountants and lawyers. And IRS guidance is no help.
With a flat tax, he would have known exactly how much to pay.
The federal government can’t balance its budget and it has the chutzpah to accuse Americans of fudging on their taxes.
Sure, there’s tax evasion and fraud and it should be dealt with but the feds should be taking a hard look at why people despise the tax system.
The ADL/SPLC told the gov that he was part of the Nubian Tax protester movement and also, I seem to remember, of their militant wing. Far as I could tell, he never had any real involvement with his tax consultants except letting them handle the whole thing.
He was pretty insanely busy at the time.
Most people never look at the tax returns - they just hand over the paperwork to their tax preparer and let him handle it.
And if the withholding is more than the reported income, most people look forward to getting a fat tax refund a couple of weeks after they have filed their tax returns.
The Passenger 57 actor was found guilty of not paying as much as $15 million in dividends to the government for his earnings from 1999 to 2001.
Is the Obama administration calling taxes "dividends" now? Or am I not reading this correctly?
I thought that taxpayers paid taxes to the government, not dividends.
Regards,
Dividend income - stocks, bonds and anything that doesn’t come from the paycheck.
And this was just a portion, I believe of his total earnings for the years in question.
Exactly. The code is subject to interpretation in many ways and if you make good money and get in the way of a bullying IRS pig, they make the interpretation to put you in a cage like an animal. In the enforcers eyes, every citizen is a criminal.
Since they started using "investment" to justify endless deficit spending they also needed to change the meaning of taxes as well.
We are living in George Orwell's 1984. I wonder when they will start calling North Korea, East-Asia?
The IRS pukes get bonuses for collections. Snipes probably would have gotten away with it if not for his association with the advisor.
His advisor is one of those who contend the income tax amendment was never properly ratified.
Guess he didn’t pay his “fair share”.
There are very few people that get up at 2 or 3 and get to work by 4 or 5 and stay there until 7 or 8 PM.
Yeah, I know .. I was blue collar my whole life and I did it, but the majority of the working class tends to do a 9-5.
When I was in a more grueling mode (a construction contract f'rinstance) that required daily punctuality and labor, I can attest that when I got home, I was damned happy to have a wife and mother there while I was gone to handle all the other life things that life demands.
Couple the schedule of filming (back to Snipes) with the constant repeating of lines (after all, you are a different person ... or ARE you ... )
The rine in spine ...
No No No .. the RANE in Spane ..
the rine in ..
NO! the RANE in SPANE ..
ah KAHNT,...I KAHNT !!
OK .. well anyway ... I have an equally deep respect for big truck drivers
Good luck, Wes.
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