Oh to be in politics and have lawyers at my beck and call that can devise the most creative strategies ever for not playing fair…
No, I’m not talking about the McCain/Obama presidential race. I’m referring to Charles O’Byrne, the now former Chief of Staff for the Governor of New York. O’Byrne, a law school grad from Columbia Law School, pulls in more than $100,000 in his position – paid for by taxpayers. But O’Byrne has not paid his own taxes in quite a bit – five years to be exact. The total owed to the feds and the State of New York (yes, the same state that pays his salary) totaled approximately $300,000. The breakdown is as follows:
STATE TAXES
$51,303 in taxes
$16,711 in penalties
$12,905 in interest
FEDERAL TAXES
$127,018 in taxes
$50,836 in penalties
$34,005 in interest
So, why didn’t he pay up until now? Not because he didn’t have the funds (he reportedly ponied up the funds this week when caught). Not because he didn’t know that he had to pay taxes. Not because he didn’t understand the rules or believe that he owed taxes.
Nope.
O’Byrne’s lawyers say he suffered from “late-filing syndrome.”
Oh yeah. Late.Filing.Syndrome.
You know… Cause you’ve read about it in all the medical journals… Oh wait, you didn’t? Right. Because it doesn’t exist.
O’Byrne’s lawyers cited the condition as an excuse for O’Byrne not making his payments. But The New York Times notes “late-filing syndrome, sometimes known as non-filing syndrome or failure-to-file syndrome, is not listed in the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders.”
Nonetheless Richard Kestenbaum, O’Byrne’s lawyer, came up with this ridiculous explanation:
Most times, with professionals, these are very high-functioning people who otherwise complete all the other ordinary tasks of their life… But there is something that they can’t do, and many times that causes them not to be able to file their tax returns.
Kestenbaum was clearly attempting to shift blame away from O’Byrne, to avoid sanctions or additional penalty. The criteria for more serious charges would be “intentional” avoidance of taxes. A nicely crafted excuse might save O’Byrne from additional punishment – if only his excuse made some sense.
New York Governor David Paterson, who hired O’Byrne, had a much better explanation, saying, “He showed poor judgment.”
That’s right. Judgment.
I work with taxpayers all of the time who are overwhelmed by the idea of filing and paying their taxes. Those folks tend to be middle class taxpayers, usually self-employed, that struggle with finding the resources to file and pay taxes. And the bottom line is that their decision not to pay is usually the result of a complicated tax code combined with limited resources to pay.
This is not the case here.
With a salary reaching $265,098 per year in 2005 (and nearly $175,000 in 2004), O’Byrne was more than well situated to hire someone to assist him in preparing and filing his returns. He chose not to. Instead, he chose to continue to pocket tax dollars of the hard-working people of New York state and later cry about getting caught.
That’s because it’s much easier to blame it on a “syndrome”, isn’t it? That’s what we do in America. Nothing is ever our own fault, it’s some sort of “thing” that we can’t control. It’s always a syndrome, a disorder, a complex. And sadly, it cheapens the plights of those who actually do suffer from serious problems.
Heaven help us if O’Byrne escapes further penalty because someone actually buys this nonsense. If it works, I suspect we’ll start seeing a lot more creative arguments. Personally, I’m waiting for “tired mom syndrome” to be in vogue. I have a lot on my plate that I’d just like to excuse away…
Hey
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Gee, maybe temporary alcoholism could also be used to avoid paying taxes — I have this unaccountable urge to drink heavily whenever I contemplate sitting down and doing my taxes every year . . .
Hmmmmm…How ’bout “LPS” (Little People Syndrome) first introduced in the U.S. about 1989 by the great tax philosopher Leona Helmsley?
Is that the new euphamism for “I’m a jerk”?
I have a syndrome. It’s called “I’m more responsible than the rich schmuck” syndrome, for I face the IRS in APRIL every year (not October – the wimp!)and I take a written IRS bashing/amendment every May or June thanks to my inability to add correctly. I subject myself to embarrassment, I expose my own intellectual limitations, and I show that even TurboTax cannot help the more inept of us by doing a thorough screwing up that return religiously. In fact, I think the audit will come the first year I get it right, for they won’t believe me.
But I do it. Why? Because it’s the law. Because even with my “syndrome”, I pay my bills and I don’t make excuses. I make way less than this dude. Yet I pay much more.
I have a syndrome called CRAPS (Citizens Revolt Agaist Political Scumbags). I seem to not be able to stand politicians (and the people they hire as ‘experts’) who can’t seem to understand they too are subject to the laws of the US and state the live in. Is there a cure? I’m hoping so…