Quatlosers Hall of Shame
Thurston Bell
These special-editions Quatloos commemorates those who have made a name for themselves in their particular business endeavors.
100 Q
Thurston Bell
Our 100Q Woopoo chips commemorate promoters of tax scams.
Tax scam artist and Quatlooser Thurston Bell (no relation to millionaire Thurston Howell III, pictured right) has become known as the chief advocate of the “861 Argument” which is basically that nobody knows what “income” is, therefore nobody except a foreigner has to pay tax on it. Presumably, if nobody could define what “air” is, Thurston and his follows would immediately stop breathing.
Well, we’re not going to waste our breath exploding Thurston’s theory – that is done below along with the U.S. Department of Justice’s press release announcing that they are seeking an injunction against Thurston Bell’s tax scamming activities.
It is a lot more fun to talk about the dispute between Thurston and fellow Qualtooser Rick Haraka a/k/a Rick Bryan. You see, Haraka runs a website at http://www.taxgate.com and Thurston participated. They had a falling out, Thurston left and formed http://www.tax-gate.com and the National Institute for Taxation Education (a/k/a “NITE” or “We Are In The Dark”). After the split-up, things turned acrimonious, with Thurston claiming that Bryan hacked into his computers, and Bryan claiming that Bell has a serious mental disorder. Thurston now claims that he was the original author of the www.taxgate.com scam, but Haraka claims that he was the one who originally came up with the scam.
According to Haraka:
We encourage those who have worked with Thurston Bell or are currently working with Bell and are:
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fed up with Thurston Bell’s poor and unprofessional casework.... usually done and delivered to you at the very last minute so that you don’t have the time to proof-read it and correct the bad grammar, misspelled words, filter out the obnoxious comments towards the very people he is trying to elicit help from, etc. etc. (Very well documented!)
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afraid of being left out on a limb when it comes time for your IRS meeting or interviews (it is well documented by those who have used Thurston Bell in the past how he left them in a severe bind and all alone when the time came for very important meetings and IRS responses)
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tired of his immature, paranoid, and volatile personality
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worn-out by his continual and unexpected severe ‘mood swings’
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weary of being embarrassed by him amongst your friends, family, and associates for his tirades and his ‘superior’ attitude
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tired of wasting hours on the phone to get a simple 2 minute question answered... if you can reach him at all!
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having to continually apologize for and remedy his damaging and careless actions..... much to your surprise and dismay, as he is busy at work doing the same thing somewhere else..... and while you are still getting the first one patched up!
Thurston Bell has repeatedly made it know that he expects researchers 20+ years his senior in experience to drop what they are doing and help him ‘perfect’ his unproven tactics and then recognize him as the leader!
Thurston Bell also has a relentless push for a “Unified Leadership”.... which ANYONE would agree is a good strategy...... no argument there at all! Except for one problem...... Thurston Bell is not content unless it is..... guess who?...... You are right..... BELL HIMSELF!
Thurston Bell wants to be the nationally recognized LEADER of the income tax law research field! Folks, in the words of 98% of the income tax community..... this ‘BELL’ is CRACKED.
OK, this is my last post on this subject. It is clear that this is a religion. That is, it is a matter of faith that we don’t have to pay income taxes, and nothing will convince you otherwise.
Therefore, let me first say that I apologize for my part in this thread getting nasty, and I wish you all well.
Second, let me suggest, since this is so obviously a religion, that you start one. Then you actually won’t have to pay taxes.
Why These Arguments Can’t Help You
We’re going to show you here why these arguments can’t help you -- and most likely will do you harm -- whether or not they are true. That is, we’re going to suppose for the sake of argument that these (demonstrably false) theories are true: In other words, we’re going to pretend that the Internal Revenue Code has no effect, and that all actions undertaken pursuant to it are illegal.
The problem is that NO COURT HAS HELD OR WILL HOLD THAT THE INTERNAL REVENUE CODE IS INVALID OR THAT THE INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE LACKS POWER TO LEVY OR COLLECT INCOME TAXES. See, e.g., Joseph Adam's The Tax Protestor Hall of Fame. Literally hundreds of folks have tried these arguments over the last several years. ALL of these folks have lost, and many of these folks have been sanctioned or fined for advocating a "frivolous" theory to the court.
So, let’s assume that you buy some of this hokey material, and you either don’t declare your income to the IRS, under whatever reason, or else you hide your money in a "Pure Trust" or other fictional legal unicorn. The IRS then comes and assesses taxes and stiff fines on you and garnishes your wages and seizes all your assets to pay for the assessments and fines. You then go into court and assert whatever screwy theory you’ve been sold as your defense against the IRS. Now, you might be (in your own mind) 100% correct. The problem is that there is a 100% chance that the court will not agree with you, and you will lose everything you have.
So, the upshot is: Even if you believe this anti-IRS crap, don’t use these theories for planning because they have a 100% chance of failure. These theories are not going to protect your assets, period, and anyone who tells you differently is a liar. You are going to get fined and sanctioned, and these fines and sanctions most likely will not be dischargeable in a bankruptcy proceeding, so they will follow you for your entire life until paid.
Zero Success Rate
These various constitutional and anti-IRS theories have had a ZERO success rate. This is evidenced by the following:
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These theories have an equally non-impressive track record for thwarting the IRS:
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Is this really something you want to use for tax planning or to hide your assets behind? If so, then you need to get a refund on that lobotomy. The fact is that these theories have not been successful in even a single case and there is no reason to believe that they will ever be successful.
U.S. v. Long -- The Dead Sea Scroll of Tax Protestors
Tax protestors will ALWAYS mention the case of U.S. v. Lloyd Long as the "victory" which "proves" that income taxes don't have to be paid. The truth:
First -- Long lost his civil case and was still liable for his taxes. The case the protestors stupidly refer to is Long's criminal case for tax evasion, which he won on, essentially, the dubious theory that he was too dumb to understand that he had to pay taxes. But Long -- like so many others -- completely failed to prove that he wasn't liable for his taxes.
Second -- In every case since Long the tax protestors have lost. They have had NO victories since then, and can't point to any, (not that Long can really even be characterized as a victory since he lost his battle to prove he wasn't liable for taxes). So if the Long case is precedent for anything, which is doubtful, it sure isn't very good precedent because NO SUBSEQUENT COURT HAS RELIED ON THE LONG CASE FOR THE ABSURD PROPOSITION THAT THERE IS NO LIABILITY FOR TAXES.
NOTE: By like token, we often get hate e-mail from tax protestors who send us cases from around the turn of the century (i.e., before the 16th Amendment authorized the income tax) or from the 1930s and 1940s (i.e., before the modern IRS code). Apparently, they can't figure out that LAWS CHANGE. And they NEVER send us cases from this decade -- the reason being that every case from this decade (and the last, for that matter) has been a loser for tax protestors.
So, if someone mentions "U.S. v. Long" to you as justification why you should not pay your tax -- RUN!!! If Long is their basis, then they have no basis, period the end.
Arguments that "Others Aren't Paying Taxes, Either"
Tax protestor materials have wild quotes that there are "40 million" nonfilers, and correctly attribute this figures to the IRS. What they don't tell you is that most of the nonfilers eventually file, or are defunct corporations and trusts which have a tax ID number and haven't reported for years, dead persons who haven't been taken off the rolls, etc. After you sift through the figures you will see that the actual number of individual nonfilers is very low, believed to be less than 10,000 per year, and not so large a number that the IRS can't eventually chase them all. And many of these are persons in very low wage jobs -- i.e., immigrant farm workers, etc. -- whom the IRS often determines isn't worth their time to chase.
Somewhat humorously, in several cases where the IRS has gone after promoters of "Don't File" schemes, it was determined that the promoter -- while advocating not filing returns -- had been filing their returns all along. This really isn't surprising, since most of the promoters will secretly confide that they really don't believe these theories either, but it makes them good money.
Don’t Be A Sucker
As shown above, these wacky theories can not and will not give you legitimate tax savings or otherwise protect your assets from the IRS. So why buy them? The fact is that the sale of these materials is nothing more-or-less than a scam, just like those books which tell people how to guess which numbers will next be picked at the lottery (and about as accurate). If you buy these materials, you are a sucker and you've been already scammed. Don't now make the mistake of following through on the advice, as about as likely as not you're likely to end up in prison on charges of tax evasion.
Links to Proof of Falsity of Theories
We are not in the business of disputing these stupid Constitutional theories -- which isn't hard to do, but instead we leave that to others. The following several (there are more) well-researched non-government private websites demonstrate the falsity of these wacky anti-IRS theories and you should refer to them:
Our Tax Protestor Theories De-Bunked Page
Daniel B. Evans' The Tax Protestor FAQ -- http://evans-legal.com/ dan/ tpfaq.html
Falgoust's Tax Protestor Myths -- http://www.geocities.com/ NapaValley/ 3578 /taxmyth.html
Joseph G. Adams' Tax Protestor Hall of Fame -- http://politicalhobbyist.com/ debunked/
Bob Sommers' The Tax Protestor Movement: Proof that P.T. Barnum was Right -- http://www.taxprophet.com/ hot/ feb96.html
Bob Sommers' The Tax Protestor Movement: Still Batting Zero -- http://www.taxprophet.com/ hot/ June98.html
Don’t Contact Us
For some reason, people feel compelled to call us or send us e-mail to argue about the legitimacy of these theories. Well don’t, because we just don’t care. As shown above, IT DOESN’T MATTER whether you are right or wrong because even if you are right (you're not) these theories aren’t going to help you anyhow, since no court will recognize these theories and they will not stop the IRS from levying taxes, fines, and sanctions, or from seizing your property. The only thing which matters to us is whether or not stuff works, and these theories have proven "in spades" that they don't.
Visit Our Tax Protestor Theories De-Bunked Page
Visit the Quatloos! Cyber-Museum of Scams & Frauds
Tax Protestor Gallery
Know of other court opinions where these wacko theories were pitched? Send them to us by our online form -- we always enjoy a good laugh! http://www.quatloos.com/taxscams/taxprot.htm