Kenneth A. Weiner - Page 14

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          assets, and extensive dealings in cash support an inference of              
          fraud.  Spies v. United States, supra at 499; Parks v.                      
          Commissioner, 94 T.C. 654, 664-665 (1990) (purchase of cashier's            
          checks to avoid filing of Currency Transaction Reports).                    
          Beginning in 1982, petitioner opened 10 separate checking and               
          savings accounts.  Then, in a series of transactions, petitioner,           
          among other things, converted over $800,000 in investor funds               
          into cashier's checks made payable to himself in order to avoid             
          creating a transactional record in the corporate accounts.                  
          Respondent has established, through petitioner's deemed                     
          admissions, that petitioner's objective was to defraud the United           
          States by conducting the financial and banking activities of the            
          investment scheme in a manner that was not readily traceable.               
               And finally, in addition to the various indicia of fraud               
          that are present, we consider as evidence of fraud petitioner's             
          conviction under section 7206(1) for filing a false income tax              
          return.  In Wright v. Commissioner, 84 T.C. 636, 643 (1985), this           
          Court concluded that a prior conviction under section 7206(1)               
          does not collaterally estop a petitioner from contesting a fraud            
          determination under section 6653(b).  However, a conviction for             
          willful falsification, while not dispositive, is evidence of                
          fraud.  Id. at 643-644.  On January 14, 1991, petitioner was                
          found guilty under section 7206(1) on two counts of filing false            
          income tax returns for 1984 and 1985.                                       





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