- 18 - to dispute the liability, the Court has held that taxpayers cannot defeat actual receipt by deliberately refusing delivery of a statutory notice. Sego v. Commissioner, 114 T.C at 610-611; Tatum v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2003-115; Carey v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2002-209; Baxter v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2001-300. Here, the testimony given at trial suggests that petitioner’s communication of the West Deer Valley address to the Internal Revenue Service in January of 1999, and subsequent failure to notify of any new addresses, may have been a deliberate preemptive attempt to prevent delivery of any notice of deficiency. The substantial nature of the relevant tax deficiencies, exceeding $250,000 for each of the years in issue, further enhances the likelihood of this scenario. To the extent that the West Deer Valley address had been outdated for 8 years or “since 1996” at the time of trial in October of 2004, the 1999 letter would have been inaccurate when written. Petitioner would reasonably be considered in such circumstances to have deliberately repudiated his opportunity to contest the notices of deficiency in this Court and likewise now to be precluded from challenging his underlying liability in this proceeding. Nonetheless, even if petitioner were entitled to contest his underlying liabilities at this juncture, he has at no time offered even a scintilla of evidence that would show error in respondent’s determinations. He declined at trial to address inPage: Previous 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Next
Last modified: May 25, 2011