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joint amended return in October 1996, as petitioner claimed.12
When petitioner’s case was eventually transferred to Appeals
Officer Talbott, however, he was unable, after investigation, to
establish that Astrid Downing had signed or had intended to file
any joint return. The administrative record indicates that
Appeals Officer Talbott requested petitioner to provide a
statement from Astrid Downing that she had intended to file a
joint return. Insofar as the record reveals, petitioner never
provided such a statement. Ultimately, the final determination
reflected Appeals Officer Talbott’s conclusion that petitioner
and Astrid Downing never filed a valid 1995 joint return. On the
12 At trial, respondent objected to admitting these two
documents into evidence on the grounds that “they are hearsay.
They are the opinions of a lower level IRS agent. They are not
the position of the Service and not binding on the Service.” The
Court provisionally admitted the documents into evidence subject
to respondent’s right to renew his objections on brief. On
brief, respondent renews his objections, but on different grounds
than asserted at trial. On brief, respondent does not assert any
hearsay objection; we deem respondent to have waived any such
objection. In any event, as shown by the discussion in the text,
we do not rely upon these documents to prove the truth of the
matters asserted therein; moreover, we do not rely upon Appeals
Officer Dugan’s conclusions expressed in these documents and do
not view them as binding upon the IRS. On brief, respondent also
objects that admission of these documents into evidence is
contrary to Fed. R. Evid. 602 and 701. We disagree. Fed. R.
Evid. 602, which limits admissible testimony to matters as to
which the witness has personal knowledge, is not germane,
inasmuch as the documents in question do not represent testimony
of a witness. Similarly, Fed. R. Evid. 701, which relates to
opinion testimony by lay witnesses, is not germane. Accordingly,
we overrule respondent’s new and renewed evidentiary objections
to Exhibits 31-P and 32-P.
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