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Petitioner did not produce any personal records of her tip
income during respondent's audit of her returns. However, at
trial, petitioner was able to introduce purported personal
records of her tip income for 1989 and 1990. She testified that
she received her tips in cash from the restaurant on the day
following the shift when the tips were earned. Attached to the
cash was a small, white paper with the amount of the tips and
petitioner's name written on it. Petitioner alleged that she
went home, recorded the amount of tip money she received on a
yellow sheet of paper, and then discarded the original white
paper. Petitioner testified she recorded her tips on these
yellow sheets every night or at least every other night.
Petitioner kept these yellow sheets in a manilla envelope in
which she kept all her Sandomenico records.
After inspection of the yellow sheets introduced by
petitioner, we do not believe that these alleged daily records
were contemporaneous and accurate records of the tip income she
received in 1989 and 1990. The uniformity and consistency of the
handwriting, as well as the appearance of the yellow sheets, lead
us to the conclusion that the entries on the sheets were written
about the same time, rather than on a daily basis over a 2-year
period. Indeed, when testifying about the amount of allocated
tips on the Forms W-2 issued to her by Sandomenico for the years
in issue, petitioner admitted "I had no idea what I made." We
can only conclude that had petitioner kept these yellow sheets
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