Posted on 05/14/2015 3:57:48 PM PDT by jazusamo
Lyndon McLellan fought the law -- and apparently, he won.
The North Carolina business owner for months has been battling the federal government after IRS agents last fall seized $107,000 from him, under a controversial practice known as civil forfeiture. But his attorneys at the Institute for Justice announced Thursday that the IRS and Department of Justice have moved to dismiss the case and give him back his money.
“What’s wrong is wrong, and what the government did here was wrong,” McLellan said in a statement Thursday. “I just hope that by standing up for what’s right, it means it won’t happen to other people.”
FoxNews.com reported earlier this week on McLellan's struggle to get his money back. The Institute for Justice said the feds moved to drop their case on Wednesday. Asked about the claim, an IRS official told FoxNews.com they could not comment on the case; a representative with DOJ has not yet responded to a request for comment.
McLellan is just one of thousands of Americans the IRS has seized money from, supposedly for “structuring” funds to avoid a law requiring banks to alert the government of deposits over $10,000. The law was instituted to help the government ferret out drug dealers, terrorists or other criminals -- but the IRS occasionally flags deposits of just under $10,000 as suspicious even if there's no evident criminal wrongdoing, in turn ensnaring people who may be innocent.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I'm no lawyer but that sounds like extortion by the government to me.
Who is going to pay for his legal expenses and the mental hell he has been put through?
They should have to pay double.
That’s the sad part about this, he has to pay legal fees and suffer through it.
Agreed!
That's a start, but the government agents involved don't care, because it's not their money, it's yours/ours. There should be serious career damage to government employees who do this sort of thing, along with the compensation you suggest.
People act as if "due process" exists when you can bankrupt yourself against the unlimited resources of the government in defense, and that isn't taken into account. In effect, the government, or a petty bureaucrat of the government, can find you guilty and fine you the cost of proving your innocence, or worse, with no risk. And, maybe it's a plus on their resume, too.
This is one of the many reasons to end the War on Drugs.
Not even close to enough.
The money, plus his normal rate of return, plus lost opportunity costs, plus any loans, plus interest he had to take out, plus mental distress, plus attorney fees....THEN triple damages because it was capricious and a gross misuse of power.
I would say, depending on the attorney time and effort, between $500,000 and $750,000.
Two months ago, the government offered McLellan 50 percent of his money back and warned him against chasing publicity, even going so far as to suggest it would rile people inside the IRS and could hurt his chances of seeing his cash again, his attorneys said. “Today the the DOJ is giving him 100 percent,” said Institute for Justice spokesman J. Justin Wilson. “We got him an enormous amount of publicity – and it did work.” Wilson said McLellan had other resources to keep his business, “L & M Convenience Mart,” open since last October. But he had to fork over $3,000 for his initial legal fees, and some $19,000 for an accountant to audit his business to prove to the government there wasn’t anything untoward going on. The government said it will not repay those costs or any interest on the seized money.This is simply OUTRAGEOUS. The IRS is acting like the Mafia. Worse.
The federal civil forteiture law has been drawing critical attention in the news media for some time. I think that most Americans see the law as inherently contradictory to basic due process laws and private property rights in this country. It’s time for Congress to simply repeal the law. Who will be the Republican and Democrat leaders to step up and sponsor the bill in the House and the Senate?
I couldn't agree more. It's not just a case of lack of common sense, it's an extortion racket they're purposely running in my view.
While I hate them, I will give the Church of Scientology credit for one thing—they are the only group I know of that out bullied the IRS. For decades the IRS refused to recognize them as a religion for tax exempt status, and claimed they owed hundreds of millions. When the IRS put a tax lien on their HQ, they followed L. Ron Hubbard’s dictum to never defend, always attack. They infiltrated members into the IRS and hired PIs to dig up dirt on everyone at the IRS who worked on the case. They stole massive amounts of documents, and claimed unknown parties just dropped them off. Then they filed multiple lawsuits against not only the IRS, but the employees involved, even demonstrated at their homes. Like all bullies, the IRS is better at dishing it out than taking it. Eventually they waived most of the money “owed” and settled for a one time payment of 12.5 million in exchange for tax exempt status for the church and over 100 subsidiary organizations.
You are correct but with the number of RATS and RINOs at the present time I doubt there’s enough patriots to pass the repeal.
They seized money from this guy, but not a sitting governor of New York who was definitely structuring payments. All in an attempt to hide violations of federal laws against procuring prostitutes across state lines. He got to walk, “in the interest of justice.”
The WoD is only today’s excuse.
They can pretend that the cash “may” represent ANY illegal activity.
These agencies are using this tactic as a fund raising tactic, not to mention all of the cool toys they confiscate.
Or so they claimed - and the jackboot-lickers ate it up.
It’s all about power. If you are a member of the ruling elite, you can get away with almost anything.
Interest? Lawyer fees? Opportunity cost? Punitive damages so this doesn’t happen to the next innocent business owner?
Well at least it didn’t cost any federal scum their salary to return this man his money.
amazing! This was all round the early 1990s
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