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petition by November 26, 2001. The petition was postmarked
October 26, 2001, but was filed with the Tax Court on January 16,
2002. Since the petition was not filed with the Tax Court until
well after November 26, 2001, it appeared that petitioners had
defaulted in failing to file a petition to the Court in response
to the notice of deficiency and respondent assessed the
deficiency. Once notified by the Court that petitioners had
filed a timely petition, respondent notified petitioners that the
assessment was abated. All this happened during the time that
mail sent to the Court in Washington, D.C. was delayed because of
measures to counteract the anthrax mail threat. The delay caused
by the anthrax mail threat accounts for the lapse in time between
the mailing of the petition and the filing of the petition with
the Tax Court.
In any event, it is well established that a “no change”
letter, which is not a closing agreement, does not prevent the
Government from reexamining the taxpayer’s return and determining
a deficiency. See Miller v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2001-55.
The same result also must obtain in the case at hand, in which
the purported “no change” letter was issued after respondent had
issued the statutory notice.
In order to give effect to our conclusions herein,
Decision will be entered
for respondent.
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Last modified: May 25, 2011