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Judge Says Four Years In Prison for Former IRS Employee Is Fair
Sherry Peel Jackson’s sentence affirmed; government indicates new initiative has been launched targeting ‘tax defiers’
By Mark Anderson
A Department of Justice news release noted: “The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit affirmed a four-year prison sentence for tax defier crimes committed by Sherry Peel Jackson, a former Internal Revenue Service employee.” The DOJ also emphasized a relatively new program called the National Tax Defier Initiative (NTDI).
The initiative—while claiming to provide First Amendment exemption for those who speak out on tax issues—targets those who attack the “foundation” of the income tax.
A tax “defier” is defined as “someone who rejects the legal foundation of the tax system, despite decades of legal precedent upholding the system’s constitutional and statutory validity, and who takes specific and concrete action to violate the law. It is this . . . conduct, which results in fraudulent claims, frivolous returns and bogus schemes, that threatens the foundation of our tax system and must be vigorously countered,” a separate DOJ online legal brief explains.
In October 2007, a jury found Miss. Jackson—a noted tax activist from Stone Mountain, Ga. who appeared in the late Aaron Russo’s America: From Freedom to Fascism film—“guilty on four counts of failure to file income tax returns,” says the DOJ. Miss Jackson was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Orinda D. Evans to four consecutive prison terms of 12 months each. She evidently is seen as just the kind of “defier” envisioned under the NTDI, given the inclusion of the NTDI in the same news release about Jackson’s harsh sentence.
“This clear affirmation of such a strong sentence should be a sign to tax defiers across the country that frivolous arguments and bogus schemes do not work and can land them in prison for years,” Nathan J. Hochman, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Tax Division, said in the release. “Under the [NTDI], the Tax Division continues to vigorously enforce federal tax laws against tax defier conduct throughout the nation.”
Noted attorney Tommy Cryer, who himself was on the receiving end of the IRS but triumphed in court, called this development: “deplorable—shameful . . .when they can’t show that she was liable for it [the income tax] in the first place.”
In the wake of his “Truth Attack” conference held in Houston Oct. 11, where the IRS was a hot topic in an organized plan to put big government back in its cage, Cryer, of Shreveport, La., said, “How do you defy something that does not exist?”
He echoed a growing consensus that the Internal Revenue Code is exceedingly vague and does not establish an actual tax liability for working Americans, but instead operates on guile and the threat of imprisonment to hoodwink Americans into believing the liability exists without ever finding out for themselves if it does.
Cryer noted at the Houston program that, among a number of contemplated actions, there will be a concerted effort to report rogue IRS agents to the Treasury/IRS Office of the Inspector General.
Cryer also observed that the DOJ is supposed to be an impartial party, yet the DOJ news release on affirming Jackson’s sentence seems anything but impartial:
“There is an air of retribution to this thing,” he said. “They should also be looking at every possible defense and taking it seriously.” Instead, the DOJ is like an “extension of the IRS,” he said, adding that the DOJ should act as a “filter” and should be just as interested in the law that the IRS bases its actions on, and in the conduct of its agents.
You can write to: Sherry Peel Jackson, 59085019, FCC Coleman Camp F2, P.O. Box 1027, Coleman, FL 33521-1027.
The main Treasury Department Office of Inspector General hotline for reporting IRS agent misconduct and other complaints is: (800) 359-3898 (a live person answers during the day); fax, (202) 927-5799. Regular mail: Treasury Hotline, Office of Inspector General, 1500 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20220. Another IRS/Treasury hotline can be reached at (800) 366-4484.
Reach Mark at [email protected]. Mark Anderson is a corresponding editor for American Free Press.
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(Issue # 45, November 10, 2008)
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