“The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small,but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.”
– President Barack Obama, Inauguration, 1/20/09
“Taxpayers trust, and expect, that IRS employees, as a whole, will safeguard their most sensitive personal information“
And the story:
Federal officials today announced arrests and charges in a stolen identity tax-refund scheme believed to involve more than $1 million in false claims and run by an IRS employee who was supposed to be assisting taxpayers experiencing problems resulting from identity theft.
A federal grand jury earlier this month indicted NAKEISHA HALL, JIMMIE GOODMAN and ABDULLA COLEMAN for their involvement in a 2008 to 2011 scheme operated out of Birmingham that involved stealing personal identity information from the Internal Revenue Service to create fraudulent tax returns and collecting the stolen refunds, announced U.S. Attorney Joyce White Vance, IRS Criminal Investigation, St. Louis Field Office, Special Agent in Charge Karl A. Stiften, and Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, Mid-States Field Division, Special Agent in Charge Ruben Florez. The indictment was unsealed with today’s arrests.
Hall, 39, is an IRS employee who worked in the Taxpayer Advocate Service office in Birmingham from July 2007 to November 2011. Since November 2011, Hall has worked in Taxpayer Advocate Service offices in Omaha, Neb., New Orleans, La., and Salt Lake City, Utah. Federal agents arrested Hall today in Holly Springs, Miss. Federal agents also arrested Goodman, 37, of Birmingham, at her Cherry Avenue residence. Coleman, 37, formerly of Birmingham, is already in state custody in Wisconsin on unrelated charges. ….
“Taxpayers trust, and expect, that IRS employees, as a whole, will safeguard their most sensitive personal information. Taxpayers also must trust that IRS employees in the Taxpayer Advocate Service will not only protect their sensitive information but will actively assist them when it has been compromised by others,” Vance said. “An IRS taxpayer advocate who exploits that trust, and with full knowledge of the significant impacts of identity theft, uses her IRS access to compromise taxpayers’ identities and steal a million dollars from the U.S. Treasury is committing a particularly egregious crime that will not go unpunished,” Vance said. “I thank the TIGTA and IRS-CI investigators who worked diligently with my office to bring this case forward.”
So tell me, what is of more value – money or Rights? I’m glad they caught these guys but it is yet another case of lawlessness within the Obama Administration (albeit, the kind that can happen in ANY Administration).
In the vein of “I’d rather die as a free man than live as a slave”, what of Lois Lerner, who from her high perch in the FEC (Federal Election Committee) and her stint in the IRS, she diminished the Right of Free Speech of a number of Conservative / TEA Party groups but the Department of Justice deigned not to bring charges? She decided to take away the rights of hundreds of folks simply for political reasons, that she believed that people who otherwise merely held political views contra hers. Her end justified her means.
Which theft is worse?
(H/T: Tax Prof via Instapundit)
