New TIGTA Report on Trends in IRS CI Investigation Activities

TIGTA has released a report, titled Trends in the Criminal Investigation Division's Enforcement Activities Showed Improvements; However, Some Goals Were Not Attained (Reference Number: 2010-30-074), which may be viewed here. The Report has some amazing information, much of it compiled in very informative charts. The following is from the Highlights section:

Highlights
Final Report issued on July 1, 2010
Highlights of Reference Number: 201030030 to the Internal Revenue Service Chief, Criminal Investigation.
IMPACT ON TAXPAYERS
The Criminal Investigation Division's (the Division) primary resource commitment is to develop and investigate legal source tax crimes. The prosecution of these cases is key to supporting the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) overall compliance goals, enhancing voluntary compliance with the tax laws, and promoting fairness and equity in our tax system.
WHY TIGTA DID THE AUDIT
This audit was initiated as part of TIGTA's Fiscal Year (FY) 2010 Annual Audit Plan and addresses the IRS' major management challenge of Tax Compliance Initiatives. The overall objective of this review was to provide a statistical portrayal with trend analyses of the Division's enforcement activities for FYs 2000 through 2009.
WHAT TIGTA FOUND
The Division achieved its goal, spending 52.4 percent of its time on legal source tax and 72 percent on total tax investigations, both at a 10-year high. The Division also reported that the number of legal source tax investigation initiations increased by 13.3 percent and the number of tax-related initiations increased by 14.4 percent. Further, the number of subjects convicted of legal source tax crimes increased 2 percent from FY 2008 and has increased 17.5 percent since FY 2004. Similarly, the number of subjects sentenced for legal source tax crimes also increased 10.5 percent from FY 2008 and has increased 40.6 percent since FY 2004. These percentages validate that tax cases are a priority for the Division.
However, the Division did not meet its goal to complete 3,900 investigations, and instead only completed 3,848 investigations during FY 2009. According to Division management, increased resources that were devoted to the prosecution of investigations in the pipeline inventory during FY 2008 resulted in a significant decrease in FY 2008 subject investigation initiations and a related decrease in case completions during FY 2009. The Division also uses the number of convictions and the conviction rate as budgetary performance measures. The Division did not meet either of its established goals for these measures, reporting declines in both the number of convictions and the conviction rate in FY 2009. Increased numbers of dismissals during FY 2009 (resulting from efforts to reduce the pipeline inventory) caused the drop in the overall conviction rate.
In addition, the Division continues to work on increasing its special agent staffing and coordinating with the operating divisions to strengthen the Fraud Referral Program.
WHAT TIGTA RECOMMENDED
Although TIGTA made no recommendations in this report, IRS officials were provided an opportunity to review the draft report. IRS management did not provide any report comments.

The Charts are:

Figure 1 -- Special Agent and Field Special Agent Staffing at the End of Each Fiscal Year

Figure 2 -- Special Agent Direct Investigative Time Expended Each Fiscal Year

Figure 3 -- Percentage of Direct Investigative Time Spent on Legal Source Tax and Total Tax Investigations Each Fiscal Year

Figure 4 -- Number of Subject Investigations Initiated and the Number Initiated per Field Agent Each Fiscal Year

Figure 5 -- Number of Subject Investigations Initiated Each Fiscal Year for Tax-Related or Nontax-Related Violations and the Percentage That Is Tax-Related

Figure 6 -- Number of Subject Investigations Initiated Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program and the Percentage That Is Legal Source Tax Crimes

Figure 7 -- Number of Subject Investigations Initiated Each Fiscal Year by Source of the Allegation or Information

Figure 8 -- Number of Fraud Referrals Received Each Fiscal Year and the Percentage Accepted

Figure 9 -- Number of Open Subject Investigations and the Total of All Investigations at the End of Each Fiscal Year and the Average Number of Each per Special Agent

Figure 10 -- Number of All Types of Investigations Open at the End of Each Fiscal Year

Figure 11 -- Number of Open Subject Investigations Each Fiscal Year for Tax-Related or Nontax-Related Violations and the Percentage That Is Tax-Related

Figure 12 -- Number of Open Subject Investigations Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program and the Percentage That Is Legal Source Tax Crimes

Figure 13 -- Average Elapsed Days of Subject Investigations Discontinued and Referred for Prosecution Each Fiscal Year

Figure 14 -- Number of Subject Investigations Referred for Prosecution Each Fiscal Year for Tax-Related or Nontax-Related Violations and the Percentage That Is Tax-Related

Figure 15 -- Number of Subject Investigations Referred for Prosecution Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program and the Percentage That Is Legal Source Tax Crimes

Figure 16 -- Number of Subjects Convicted and Sentenced for a Crime Each Fiscal Year

Figure 17 -- Number of Subjects Convicted of a Crime Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program and the Percentage That Is Legal Source Tax Crimes

Figure 18 -- Number of Subjects Sentenced for a Crime Each Fiscal Year for Tax-Related or Nontax-Related Violations and the Percentage That Is Tax-Related

Figure 19 -- Number of Subjects Sentenced for a Crime Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program and the Percentage That Is Legal Source Tax Crimes

Figure 20 -- Average Number of Months a Subject Is Incarcerated Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program

Figure 21 -- Percentage of Investigations That Received Publicity Each Fiscal Year by Compliance Strategy Program