Here is Cryer’s motion to dismiss. The judge denied it, but the jury must have accepted it. If you are interested, could you point out where Cryer is wrong?
http://www.wethepeoplefoundation.org/MISC/Cryer/CRYER—MotiontoDismiss.pdf
There are three essential elements to the crime of tax evasion, namely (1) willfulness; (2) existence of a tax deficiency; and (3) an affirmative act constituting an evasion or attempted evasion of the tax
This backs what I have been saying since my first post. He could have been found innocent because the first element of the crime was lacking, without the jury even passing judgement on the second element of the crime. And note, unlike what another poster here thinks, there is a difference between willfulness and affirmative act. He affirmatively acted not to pay, but, he did not believe he had to pay.
As for his detailed responses, I have two comments: First, I find this claim about the 16th amendment not expanding the power to tax to be wholly bizarre and absurd on its face. I would love to see the underlying argument that another poster here has alluded to. Perhaps that judge in that case believed that the Feds already had the power to tax incomes (after all, they did it during the civil war) and thus remarked once that the 16th added no new powers? I don't know.
It is difficult to wade through the details of the rest of his arguement, but it seems to revolve around the following points: A. That case law requires a strict construction of tax laws. B. That it doesn't plainly state that he owes the tax, therefore under A. he doesn't owe it. C. And Besides, he doesn't owe it anyway per various tax protestor arguments of what the term income means. Let me take these out of order:
C. That argument has been tried again and again and laughed out of court. The courts of ruled endlessly that income is what it is in the plain meaning of the word, as commonly used by the IRS. You might think its wrong, but that issue has been decided, and not in our favor.
A. Well, I hope that's the case. It is hard to pass judgement on this sort of thing because I have no idea if the cases he is citing are 3 of 2000, or are in fact major precedent setting cases.
B. This is the argument that it seems that you have been most interested in for the length of this thread. He is stating that, in essence, its confusing as hell, and since the courst require a strict construction, if you want me to pay then you have to tell me where it says that I have to pay. Again, it is difficult to comment. I will look around, but my guess is that this has been tried before, but I'm not sure. I will say, though, that I can see that how it would be a very appealing argument to a jury that is looking for a reason to acquit (which not all juries would... I doubt that this would work in New Jersey or california).
He didn’t need to be right. He just needed to convince the jury he was stupid enough to believe this crap.
BTW, he still owes the tax.