Thursday, January 21, 2016
The IRS Scandal, Day 987
Americans for Tax Reform, IRS Erases Hard Drive Despite Court Order:
The IRS erased a hard drive belonging to a former top employee involved in the agency’s controversial, taxpayer-funded hiring of elite trial law firm Quinn Emanuel.
Although there was a court preservation order on all documents related to the IRS hiring of the outside firm, the hard drive was erased anyway. The order was borne of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request submitted by Microsoft.
Even though the white shoe law firm has zero experience handling sensitive tax data, taxpayers have been footing bills of over $1,000 per hour for its services.
The deleted hard drive belonged to the agency’s former director of transfer pricing operations at the IRS Large Business and International Division, likely a key employee involved in the controversy. It is not known if there is any way to recover documents belonging to the employee. ...
This is not the first time the agency has failed to preserve key information. The IRS also “accidentally” destroyed the hard drive belonging to Lois Lerner during investigations into the targeting of conservative groups. As many as 24,000 emails were lost forever when 422 backup tapes were wiped clean despite an agency-wide preservation order and congressional subpoena.
In the Lerner case, the IRS failed to take simple steps to ensure compliance with the order, according to a report by the House Oversight Committee.
Now, it appears that important information has once again disappeared because of IRS corruption, incompetence, or both.
- Breitbart, IRS Wipes Hard Drive that Court Ordered It to Preserve
- The Hill, Senators Press the IRS for Information About Erased Hard Drive
- Law 360, IRS Under Fire For Hard Drive Wipe In Quinn Emanuel Case
- Register, IRS 'Inadvertently' Wiped Hard Drive Microsoft Demanded in Audit Row
- The IRS Scandal, Day 986 (Jan. 20, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 985 (Jan. 19, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 984 (Jan. 18, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 983 (Jan. 17, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 982 (Jan. 16, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 981 (Jan. 15, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 980 (Jan. 14, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 979 (Jan. 13, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 978 (Jan. 12, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 977 (Jan. 11, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 976 (Jan. 10, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 975 (Jan. 9, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 974 (Jan. 8, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 973 (Jan. 7, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 972 (Jan. 6, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 971 (Jan. 5, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 970 (Jan. 4, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 969 (Jan. 3, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 968 (Jan. 2, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 967 (Jan. 1, 2016)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 966 (Dec. 31, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 965 (Dec. 30, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 964 (Dec. 29, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 963 (Dec. 28, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 962 (Dec. 27, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 961 (Dec. 26, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 960 (Dec. 25, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 959 (Dec. 24, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 958 (Dec. 23, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 957 (Dec. 22, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 956 (Dec. 21, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 955 (Dec. 20, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 954 (Dec. 19, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 953 (Dec. 18, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 952 (Dec. 17, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 951 (Dec. 16, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 950 (Dec. 15, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 949 (Dec. 14, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 948 (Dec. 13, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 947 (Dec. 12, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 946 (Dec. 11, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 945 (Dec. 10, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 944 (Dec. 9, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 943 (Dec. 8, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 942 (Dec. 7, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 941 (Dec. 6, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 940 (Dec. 5, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 939 (Dec. 4, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 938 (Dec. 3, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 937 (Dec. 2, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 936 (Dec. 1, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 935 (Nov. 30, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 934 (Nov. 29, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 933 (Nov. 28, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 932 (Nov. 27, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 931 (Nov. 26, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 930 (Nov. 25, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 929 (Nov. 24, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 928 (Nov. 23, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 927 (Nov. 22, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 926 (Nov. 21, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 925 (Nov. 20, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 924 (Nov. 19, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 923 (Nov. 18, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 922 (Nov. 17, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 921 (Nov. 16, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 920 (Nov. 15, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 919 (Nov. 14, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 918 (Nov. 13, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 917 (Nov. 12, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 916 (Nov. 11, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 915 (Nov. 10, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 914 (Nov. 9, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 913 (Nov. 8, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 912 (Nov. 7, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 911 (Nov. 6, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 910 (Nov. 5, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 909 (Nov. 4, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 908 (Nov. 3, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 907 (Nov. 2, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 906 (Nov. 1, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 905 (Oct. 31, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 904 (Oct. 30, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 903 (Oct. 29, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 902 (Oct. 28, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Day 901 (Oct. 27, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 801-900 (July 19, 2015 - Oct. 26, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 701-800 (April 10, 2015 - July 18, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 601-700 (Dec. 31, 2014 - April 9, 2015)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 501-600 (Sept. 22, 2014-Dec. 30, 2014)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 401-500 (June 14, 2014 - Sept. 21,2014)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 301-400 (Mar. 6, 2014 - June 13, 2014)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 201-300 (Nov. 26, 2013 - Mar. 5, 2014)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 101-200 (Aug. 18, 2013 - Nov. 25, 2013)
- The IRS Scandal, Days 1-100 (May 10, 2013 - Aug. 17, 2013)
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2016/01/the-irs-scandal-day-987.html
Comments
Wouldn't the IT department or the FOIA officer be held accountable, at some point, by some judge? Sheesh. This has happened multiple times ...
Posted by: RNR | Jan 21, 2016 10:31:21 AM
"Serious prison time" assumes a Justice Department interested in prosecuting misbehavior.....
It's time to make violations of FOIA a civil matter for the individual responsible for the records. I'll wager federal employees will be much more careful when someone like Judicial Watch or Americans for TaxReform can sue and take their house.
Posted by: Aaron | Jan 21, 2016 8:56:15 AM
Has the judge reacted? Anybody been thrown in jail? Of course not. But then this isn't Watergate. THAT was a Republican scandal, Democrats always get the judicial benefit of the doubt, even though there is none here. Just a disgrace. And of course, little to no MSM coverage.
Posted by: VoteOutIncumbents | Jan 21, 2016 8:19:04 AM
1. The IRS did not erase LLerner’s hard drive. Lerner’s hard drive failed and was replaced. There is no evidence that Lerner or anyone else purposefully killed the hard drive.
2. Mr. VOI: Why is this a Democrat/Republican issue for you? You seem to believe everything–in an agency that has a grand total of TWO political appointees–is political. What political motivation would exist for the erasure of a hard drive relating to the hiring of a private-contractor law firm? Benghazi, Benghazi, Benghazi. See #3 below.
3. This dispute is interesting because conservatives usually promote the hiring of private contractors and/or privatization of everything. Now they turn about and attack it. In this case, the IRS (and/or Chief Counsel, not clear from the case) hired a large, reputable, private law firm to handle a large, complicated tax dispute. In almost all instances, conservatives argue that private contractors are better than gubmint employees because. Because and because. Here, they are arguing that the private law firm lacks sufficient experience.
4. And get a load of the argument that the contractor is inappropriate–“the white shoe law firm has zero experience handling sensitive tax data.” Really!? I am really surprised to learn that the IRS hired a white shoe firm that “has zero experience handling sensitive tax data.” I guess the firm never received any “sensitive tax data” from any of its Fortune 500 tax clients? Never stored sensitive tax data of its clients? Never litigated a tax case with “sensitive tax data?” Really?
Posted by: Publius Novus | Jan 21, 2016 10:45:19 AM