- 6 - vacated, it would force the Court to decide the case solely on this paltry record. Noting the extreme disparity in legal skills3 and its probable effect on the ability of the judicial process to reach a just result, pro bono counsel stepped in to represent Lovenguth. Those counsel completed their review of the spotty record and have now moved to vacate or modify the stipulations so that the case can be decided on its merits. As reformulated by counsel, Lovenguth bases his claim for interest abatement on three arguments. The first is that he was incompetent to attend to his daily living activities, let alone litigation in this court, when his original deficiency case was dismissed for lack of prosecution. The second is that the Commissioner failed to make the necessary efforts to contact him, which resulted in a large portion of the interest Lovenguth was forced to pay. His third claim, which is an extension of the second, is that because his VA benefits were paid out of Treasury funds and the IRS is part of the Treasury, the Commissioner should have been able to locate him. Lovenguth believes that had the Commissioner contacted him in a timely manner, he would have been able to satisfy both his tax liability and the then much smaller interest liability out of his lump-sum VA payment. 3 Here, for instance, is Lovenguth’s entire brief on the merits, which he wrote in longhand: “I request my abatement of be approved. The Dept. Treasury have been sending me my compensation payment for 100 percent service-connection since 1991. IRS clearly knew my addresses.”Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 NextLast modified: November 10, 2007