- 11 -
Appeals Officer Talbott requested petitioner to provide
additional information, including a statement from Astrid Downing
that she had intended to file a 1995 joint return with
petitioner. Insofar as the record reveals, petitioner never
provided such a statement.
Ultimately, Appeals Officer Talbott determined that no joint
return had been filed. According to his case activity records,
however, Appeals Officer Talbott offered “to abate the 1995 FTF
[failure to file] penalty, apply the $8,728 from excess
collections and assume that a [married filing separate] return
was filed as of 10/30/96.” Petitioner rejected this offer.4
Nevertheless, the final notice of determination, dated March 8,
2005, adopted this approach, while sustaining the notice of tax
lien.5 An attachment to the notice of determination, “Attachment
--Letter 3193, Notice of Determination”, states in pertinent
part:
The administrative file includes a Form 1040 for 1995,
which was not signed by either the taxpayer or the
preparer, showing a tax liability of $77,017, claiming
4 The parties also continued to disagree over the treatment
of the $25,000 payment that petitioner had submitted with his
1995 filing extension request. Respondent’s records showed that
$21,612 of this payment had been refunded to petitioner and
Astrid Downing in 1996. Petitioner proposed that half this
refund be applied to his 1995 tax. Appeals Officer Talbott
rejected this offer but agreed to abate interest on petitioner’s
1995 tax liability to the extent associated with a $25,000
payment.
5 Also on Mar. 8, 2005, respondent issued an “Equivalent
Hearing” decision letter concluding that the levy with respect to
petitioner’s 1995 and 1999 tax was appropriate.
Page: Previous 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Next
Last modified: November 10, 2007