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income tax returns for those years. For 2003 and 2004,
petitioner claimed one of his two children as a dependent for
purposes of claiming a dependency exemption.
Petitioner also claimed a dependency exemption for his
brother’s son (nephew), who was approximately 12 years old during
2003 and 2004. Petitioner’s brother resided in Sudan during 2003
and 2004. During 2003, the nephew lived in petitioner’s home,
and petitioner provided all of the nephew’s support. During
2004, the nephew lived in petitioner’s sister’s home and
petitioner provided some of the nephew’s support, but petitioner
did not know whether the amount he provided was more than one-
half of the nephew’s support.
The issues we consider depend largely on the seminal issue
of whether petitioner’s nephew was a dependent as defined in
section 152 for 2003 or 2004. Before the 2005 amendments to the
Internal Revenue Code, section 152(a) defined a dependent as,
among others, a taxpayer’s niece or nephew over half of whose
support was received from the taxpayer. Sec. 152(a)(6).
Petitioner’s nephew met the section 152 dependency tests for
2003, but not for 2004 because petitioner did not establish that
he provided over half the nephew’s support. Accordingly,
petitioner is entitled to claim a dependency exemption for his
nephew for 2003, but not for 2004.
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Last modified: November 10, 2007