CA6 Affirms Tax Obstruction Conviction (3/27/21)

In United States v. Avery (6th Cir. 3/26/21)(Unpublished), CA6 here and TN here, the Court affirmed Avery’s conviction for one count of tax obstruction, § 7212(a).  This is an unpublished opinion and, in the context, a fairly routine holding.  There are, however, two items I think worth mentioning

1.  A picky point.  The Court said (Slip Op. 6):  “The Department of Justice Tax  Division indicted DeSanto, Cespedes, and Avery in February 2018.”  The judges on the panel and their clerks and the other judges on the panel should know better than that.  Grand juries indict.  (I did LEXIS-NEXIS searches on “Department of Justice Tax  Division indicted” and “Tax  Division indicted” and got no hits.  (The Avery case is apparently not yet loaded on L-N.)

2. The Court makes a footnote comment (Slip Op. 6 n. 3):

n3 We find it puzzling that Avery did not challenge the substantive reasonableness of the restitution portion of her sentence. At oral argument, Avery's attorney pointed out that Avery's actions alone were not responsible for any of the IRS's losses, and neither caused the IRS a pecuniary loss nor met any other provision of 18 U.S.C. § 3663A(c) that would mandate restitution. Nor did the government argue that Avery was responsible for Integrated's falling behind on its taxes; rather, it made clear that its only claim against Avery was that she obstructed or impeded the IRS investigation. And the record does not suggest that Avery's obstructions prevented the IRS from pursuing the delinquent taxes; indeed, the IRS issued assessments for them and has begun collecting on those assessments.

CA9 Holds in Boyd that Nonwillful FBAR Civil Penalty Is Per Form Rather Than Per Account When Correct Delinquent FBAR Is Filed (3/24/21; 3/31/21))

Added 3/31/21 3:30pm:  Lavar Taylor, here, Boyd's lawyer and a force in the national tax community, emailed me some comments on my offering on the Boyd case.  Lavar authorized me to include his comments at the end of this blog.  I highly recommend his comments to readers interest in the general subject matter.

In United States v. Boyd, 991 F.3d 1077 (9th Cir. 2021), CA9 here and TN here, the Court held that the FBAR nonwillful penalty is per annual form rather than per account that should have been reported on the form.  With this opinion, there seems to be a consensus on this holding that is likely to continue.

I have not tried to delve deeply into the majority and dissenting opinions to determine which of the two presents the best case (or whether neither of them does).  So, this blog is not about the merits of the bottom-line holding, but about some of the distractions I found in the opinions.

1. I was particularly surprised to see the dissenter (Judge Ikuta, Wikipedia here) say this as a concluding shot at the majority (Slip op. 31) :  “By holding otherwise, the majority misinterprets the relevant statutes and regulations in a manner that unfairly favors the tax evader.”  The dissenter is just wrong.  There was no tax evader in the case and the opinion does not favor tax evaders.  The case involved the nonwillful penalty, not the willful penalty.  The willful penalty is the one that would apply if tax evasion (a term of art) were involved.  Tax evasion is penalized under criminal and civil penalty regimes--§ 7201 (tax evasion) and 6663 (civil fraud), respectively.  The standard for both penalties is Cheek’s intentional violation of a known legal duty.  I explain that claim in Federal Tax Procedure 320-321 (Practitioner Ed. 2020), here. There is no suggestion in the case that Boyd was a tax evader or that any other taxpayer subject to the nonwillful penalty is a tax evader or subject to any of the income tax penalties (criminal or civil) applying to tax evaders.  Indeed, if the IRS thought Boyd (or any other taxpayer) were tax evaders, surely the IRS would assert the willful FBAR penalty for the failure to file the FBAR on its original due date.  Keep in mind in  this regard that the willful FBAR penalty, as interpreted  is subject to a looser standard than the Cheek standard, permitting the willful penalty for recklessness which could not support a criminal or civil tax penalty for criminal evasion or its civil counterpart, tax fraud.  So, in my opinion, Judge Ikuta is way out of bounds to make the closing sound bite, as cute as it is, of helping the tax evader.  And Judge Ikuta is particularly out of bounds to make the claim implicit in the quote that Boyd is a tax evader being helped by the majority's interpretation. 

2.  On the merits, the majority seems to limit its per account holding to cases where the following elements are both present:  (i) the FBAR was not timely filed and (conjunctive) (ii) a delinquent but correct FBAR was filed.  Is the Court saying that the result would be different (nonwillful penalty per account) if the taxpayer had not filed a delinquent correct FBAR (either not filed a delinquent FBAR or filed an incorrect delinquent FBAR)?  I thought the penalty applied on the date the FBAR was due (then 6/30) and not filed timely rather than anything that happened later. If that is correct, it should not matter whether a delinquent FBAR (whether correct or incorrect) was filed.  Of course, the delinquent filing of an incorrect FBAR, if  willful,  would subject the taxpayer to the willful penalty (but even there the date for measuring that penalty, I thought, was the filing date and the IRS should have to show willfulness in failing to file on that date).  As to the willful penalty, the correctly reported accounts on a delinquent return does not affect the penalty base for all accounnts willfully not reported on the filing due date.    The majority seems to adopt this view on p. 16 n. 10:  “Under both scenarios [willful and nonwillflul], the violation flows from the failure to file a timely and accurate FBAR.”  If the Court is correct on the conjunctive requirements, taxpayers missing the filing dates should always file correct delinquent FBARs if audited just to protect against the possibility that failure to do so might permit the penalty to apply per account (even as unlikely that a court would sustain that interpretation).

Another Failed Judicial Contest of the FBAR Willful Penalty (3/23/21)

In Kimble v. United States, 991 F.3d 1238 (Fed. Cir. 3/22/21), TN here, in an appeal from an adverse holding in a refund suit, the Court sustained the willful FBAR civil penalty.  Unfortunately for Kimble, neither the facts nor the law was helpful.

The Court almost summarily dispatched Kimble’s main arguments about the CFC’s holding sustaining the penalty.

Here, the parties do not dispute that Ms. Kimble failed to disclose a foreign bank account that she was required to disclose. Rather, Ms. Kimble argues that her violation was not “willful.” We hold that, based on the undisputed facts, it was not clear error for the Court of Federal Claims to find Ms. Kimble's violation willful.

Contrary to Ms. Kimble's argument that a taxpayer cannot commit a willful violation without “actual knowledge of the obligation to file an FBAR,” Appellant's Br. 32, we have held that “willfulness in the context of § 5321(a)(5)(C) includes recklessness,” Norman, 942 F.3d at 1115. Accordingly, a taxpayer signing their returns cannot escape the requirements of the law by failing to review their tax returns. Id. at 1116 (“[W]hether [the taxpayer] ever read her . . . tax return is of no import because '[a] taxpayer who signs a tax return will not be heard to claim innocence for not having actually read the return, as . . . she is charged with constructive knowledge of its contents.'”) (quoting Greer v. Comm'r, 595 F.3d 338, 347 n.4 (6th Cir. 2010)).

The undisputed facts show that Ms. Kimble knew about the numbered account and took efforts to keep it secret by, among other things, not disclosing the account to her accountant. She did not review her tax returns for 2003-2008, but she represented under penalty of perjury that she had reviewed her tax returns and had no foreign accounts. J.A. 17. In other words, Ms. Kimble had a secret foreign account, she had constructive knowledge of the requirement to disclose that account, and she falsely represented that she had no such accounts. Under these facts, it was not clear error for the Court of Federal Claims to hold that she committed a willful violation. n2 

   n2 Ms. Kimble's reasons for the violation (her subjective belief about the need for secrecy, advice from her ex-husband, etc.) do not alter our inquiry. A taxpayer can be “willful” even if her violation has good reason. See Bedrosian v. United States, 912 F.3d 144, 153 (3d Cir. 2018) (inquiring into “subjective motivations and the overall 'egregiousness' of [the taxpayer's] conduct . . . [is] not required to establish willfulness in this context”); Norman, 942 F.3d at 1116 (“Actions can be willful even if taken on the advice of another.”). And there is no “reasonable cause” exception for willful violations. 31 U.S.C. § 5321(a)(5)(C)(ii).

The Court then moved to Kimble’s hail Mary arguments and also handily dispatched them.

Another Court Adopts Nonwillful Penalty Per Form Rather than Per Account (3/19/2)

In United States v. Giraldi (D. N.J. 3/16/21), TN here and TN pdf here, the Court held (Slip op. 8): “[T]his Court aligns with the more persuasive reasoning in Bittner and Kaufman. Accordingly, pursuant to Section 5321(a)(5)(B)(i) of the BSA, penalties for non-willful reporting violations attach to each FBAR form rather than any undisclosed foreign financial account.”

The Court distinguishes the only contrary precedent, Boyd, as follows (Slip op. 15): “Significantly, the court merely reiterated the Government's arguments and conducted no analysis in coming to its conclusion.”

I see a trend developing for per form rather than per account.  For what it is worth, I think that is the right answer.  I do note, however, that the judge indicated that the opinion was not to be published.  I don’t know what that is about because it is a well written opinion in an area of law still not settled.

Court Denies APA Attack on SDP Transition Denial Allegedly Forcing Taxpayers to Accept OVDP Penalty Structure (3/16/21)

In Harrison v. IRS, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45582 (D. D.C. 3/11/21),* here, the taxpayers entered the OVDP program prior to the IRS offering the Streamlined Domestic Procedures (“SDP” program in 2014.  The SDP penalty requirements were less than the OVDP’s penalty requirements and required taxpayers to certify nonwillfulness and provide support for that certification.  Incident to the SDP, the IRS permitted taxpayers then in OVDP to “transition” to SDP.  The transition required (just as the SDP required) that taxpayers certify nonwillfulness and support the certification.  The IRS (through its Central Review Committee, determined that the taxpayers had not established their nonwillfulness and therefore left them in OVDP where the options were (i) accept the OVDP penalty structure which was more than SDP but less than the law could impose outside OVDP or (ii) opt out of OVDP and take their chances on audit.  Rather than take the risk of higher penalties on audit, the taxpayers chose to accept the OVDP penalty structure.  Accepting OVDP required that the taxpayers enter a closing agreement which provided, in part, that the taxpayers would not file a claim for refund of any amounts paid pursuant to the closing agreement.  They did and paid the resulting tax, penalties and interest, including the miscellaneous offshore penalty in lieu of an FBAR penalty in the amount of $519,943.44.

Two years after entering the closing agreement, the taxpayers brought what was in effect a refund suit but, apparently realizing that the closing agreement might be a bar, couched the suit under a mélange of legal theories:  (i) APA claims that the transition rules were adopted without notice and comment and, in any event, were arbitrary and capricious under APA section 706(2)(A); (ii) Due Process claim based on the alleged purported absence of procedural protections; and (iii) duress claim that the Closing Agreement was invalid.

The Court rejected their claims.  The Procedurally Taxing Blog has a good discussion of the APA aspect of the case.  Leslie Book, APA Offers No Avenue For Relief For Challenge to Offshore Transition Rules Penalty Regime (Procedurally Taxing Blog 3/15/21), here.  Basically, the Court held that a refund suit would be an adequate remedy thus precluding subject matter jurisdiction of the APA claims.  I encourage readers to read that blog and will only address here some nuances on the APA claims.  

 In the blog, Professor Book states:  “The needle can still be thread: if someone else  has fully paid and is not subject to a closing agreement they could bring a refund suit in federal court and get a court to consider the merits of the APA challenge.”  That is the part I want to thrash upon further.

Let’s posit that a taxpayer in the situation in the case did not accept the OVDP settlement but instead took their chances on audit and the general maximum 50% penalty was imposed.  No closing agreement is required.  So, in that case, I suppose Professor Book’s statement is that the taxpayers could then pursue their APA claims in the refund suit; alternatively, and more likely, the government would have pursued a collection suit and the taxpayer’s APA arguments could be pursued there (recall that the government must bring that suit within two years of the assessment of the FBAR penalty).  (In considering a refund suit possibility, recall also that full pre-litigation payment may not be required (James R. Malone, Half a Loaf Might Suffice: FBARS, Flora and Federal Jurisdiction (Post & Schell Tax Controversy Posts 2/13/17), here.) and in the collection suit, no pre-litigation payment is required.)  I suppose both of those potential options to present the APA claims might be deemed sufficiently adequate to preclude stand alone jurisdiction to present the APA claims.

 What exactly are those APA claims?

 Failure to adopt with notice and comment rulemaking

Good Article on the State of the Vance Investigation of Trump and Trump Organization (3/15/21)

A good article on the Vance, Manhattan District Attorney, investigation of Trump and the Trump organization.  Jane Mayer, Can Cyrus Vance, Jr., Nail Trump? (New Yorker 3/12/21), here (may require a paid subscription to read).  A good excerpt for tax crimes enthusiasts:

Many legal experts believe that, without an inside witness such as Allen Weisselberg on the stand, it could be hard to persuade a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump knowingly engaged in fraud. Tax cases are notoriously difficult to prosecute, because the details are dull and complicated; ignorance can be an effective defense. The hurdle is proving criminal intent. And, as Bharara pointed out, “Trump is actually very clever.” He learned from his early mentor Roy Cohn, the infamous fixer and Mob lawyer, to leave no fingerprints. He writes very little down, has no computer on his desk, has never had a personal e-mail address, and relies on close aides to send text messages for him. Also, as Barbara Res, an engineer who worked for Trump, recalled, he is skilled at issuing orders obliquely. Res told me, “He would direct work in a way that you knew what he wanted you to do without him actually telling you.”

The targets of complex financial prosecutions often defend themselves by noting that their accountants and lawyers had approved their allegedly criminal actions. Trump has already started making this argument. In a statement denouncing the Supreme Court’s upholding of Vance’s subpoena, Trump protested that his tax returns “were done by among the biggest and most prestigious law and accounting firms in the U.S.”

Readers may recognize Jane Mayer, the author of the article, as an outstanding investigative journalist.  See her Wikipedia page, here.

Allegations of Continuing Misconduct Against A Supposedly Chastened Credit Suisse (3/14/21)

The New York Time has this article:  Katie Benner and Michael Forsythe, Whistle-Blower Says Credit Suisse Helped Clients Skip Taxes After Promising to Stop (NYT 3/13/21), here, reporting allegations for continuing misconduct after the 2014 plea agreement.  See Credit Suisse Pleads to One Count of Conspiracy to Aiding and Assisting (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 5/19/14; 5/20/14), here, and Credit Suisse is Sentenced: Is It just a Wrist Slapping (Harder than UBS But Is It Enough)? (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 11/21/14), here.

The whistleblower started making the allegations even before the Credit Suisse plea agreement and has continued making allegations of misconduct after.  The whistleblower’s attorney, Jeffrey Neiman (web page here), alleges that his clients has names of U.S. persons whom Credit Suisse continued to assist in cheating on U.S. tax and is submitting information to the IRS’s Whistleblower Office.  According to the article, earlier submissions by this whistleblower led to the conviction of Dan Horsky, whose conviction and sentencing I reported earlier.  See Horsky is Sentenced for Major Offshore Accounts (2/11/17; 2/12/17), here.

As readers know, there are substantial potential rewards for whistleblowers (15-30% of collected proceeds which includes FBAR penalties).  See § 7623(b), here. For Horsky alone his tax exceeded $18 and FBAR penalty was $100 million.  See Former Business Professor Pleads Guilty to Tax Related Crimes; In Addition, Will Pay $100 Million FBAR Penalty (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 11/4/16; 11/9/16), here.  So, if the whistleblower received an award for that, he would have gotten at least 15% of that amount and perhaps more up to 30%.  And, apparently, the whistleblower is not claiming more whistleblower awards.

Rahn+Bodmer, Swiss Bank Category 1, Enters Deferred Prosecution Agreement (3/12/21)

UAO SDNY issued this press release titled:  Zurich’s Oldest Private Bank Admits To Helping U.S. Taxpayers Hide Offshore Accounts From IRS: Rahn+Bodmer Enters into Deferred Prosecution Agreement for Criminal Misconduct; Agrees to Pay $22 Million (3/12/21).  The deferred prosecution agreement (“DPA”) is here.  The DPA waives indictment and consents to the filing of a criminal information charging a single conspiracy count encompassing both a defraud conspiracy and offense conspiracies (evasion, § 7201 and tax perjury, § 7206(1)).

The announcement and underlying documents assert a standard litany of misconduct that was typical of Swiss banks' actions to help U.S. taxpayers cheat on their taxes.  R+B is just the latest of the small group of Category 1 Swiss Banks that were under investigation when DOJ Tax offered its Swiss Bank Program.  According to my spreadsheet, 19 Banks are listed as Category 1 but I think there is some duplication in that number.  At any rate, it is a small number relative to all of the Swiss banks engaging in this type of misconduct.

My spreadsheet indicates the following for Category 1 Swiss Banks (with duplication in the number of banks (but not in total costs)

US DOJ Swiss Bank Program	Number	Resolved	Total Costs
U.S. / Swiss Bank Initiative Category 1	19	14	$5,065,199,035

These Category 1 DPAs should be distinguished from the nonprosecution agreements reached with Swiss Banks in other categories under the DOJ Swiss Bank Program where the Swiss banks resolving their U.S. tax criminal issues are listed here.

Panama Papers Produces Another Plea and Conviction, Previously Sealed (3/7/21)

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (“ICIJ”) has this release announcing the plea, conviction and sentencing of a person, Joachim Alexander von der Goltz, implicated in the Panama Papers disclosures.  As reported, this is the third person brought to justice pursuant to the Panama Papers disclosures.  One of the others convicted was Joachim Alexander’s father, Harald Joachim Von Der Goltz.

From the Pacer docket entries, it appears that a superseding indictment, apparently the seventh, had been sealed from 12/6/19 until 3/4/21.  (Dkt. Entries 288 and 289.)  The sealed superseding indictment now released is here.  The superseding indictment charged: (i) an offense conspiracy to commit tax evasion, Count One; (2) tax perjury (§ 7206(1) (Count Two); and (3) willful failure to file FBARs, Count Three.  The guilty plea was entered on 12/17/19 and filed under seal (Dkt. Entry 291.)  On 3/4/21, von der Golttz was sentenced to time served (whatever that was), with 3 years of supervised release.  See judgment here.  $230,365 of tax restitution was ordered.

The CourtListener docket entries are here but, of the time of posting this blog had  not been updated, even though some of the later Pacer entry documents had worked their way to CourtListener.  Not sure about that, but I assume that CourtListener's algorithms will update the docket entries soon.  In the meantime, they can be viewed on Pacer but that will require a Pacer account and fees for access.

JAT Comment:

1. It is not clear why the tax offense charged was tax perjury, § 7206(1), rather than tax evasion.  I would think that the conduct to support an offense conspiracy to commit tax evasion could suffice for the substantive tax evasion charge.  Section 7201 criminalizes willful "attempts in any manner to evade or defeat any tax imposed by this title."  A conspiracy to do so seems to fit that broad description.  

Indictment for FBAR Charges, False Income Tax Returns and False Streamlined Submission (3/4/21)

Yesterday, DOJ Tax issued this press release:  Businessman Indicted for Not Reporting Foreign Bank Accounts and Filing False Documents with the IRS, here.  The press release announces charges for failure to report accounts on the FBARs for 2010 through 2016 and for false income tax returns for the same years “that did not report to the IRS all of his foreign bank accounts and income.”  The latter seems oddly worded since it does not state that the charge relates to failure to report the income from the accounts.  (I suppose it is possible that the income may have been properly reported and the Forms 8938 may have been false, but that seems odd.)

I think the most important item in the press release is the following:

Rahman is also charged with filing a false “Streamlined Submission” in conjunction with the IRS Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures. Those procedures allowed eligible taxpayers residing within the United States, who failed to report gross income from foreign financial accounts on prior tax returns, failed to pay taxes on that gross income, or who failed to submit an FBAR disclosing foreign financial accounts, to voluntarily disclose their conduct to the IRS and to pay a reduced penalty if their conduct was non-willful. The indictment alleges that Rahman’s Streamlined Submission did not truthfully disclose all the foreign bank accounts in which he had an interest, and falsely claimed that his failure to report all income, pay all tax, and submit all required information returns, such as FBARs, was non-willful.

In other words, Rahman omitted from the Streamlined Submission accounts he should have disclose and falsely certified his alleged nonwillfulness.  I just wonder whether, had he disclosed all accounts in the Streamlined Submission and certified nonwillfulness, the Government would have prosecuted for that certification alone.  I don't know the answer to that, but the Government has asserted that it is prepared to charge false nonwillful certifications.

I previously reported on charges for false Streamlined Submissions in the following (reverse chronological order):

• Recent Article on Prosecution for False Certification of Nonwillfulness (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 4/1/20), here.
• Taxpayer Charged with False SFCP NonWillful Certification (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 8/26/19), here.

I did a Pacer search to find the indictment but the search returned the following information: Proceedings for case 1:21-cr-00022-LMB are not available.  The CourtListener docket entries for the case are here.  I created an alert in CourtListener, so when I should get an alert when the CL docket entries are refreshed.  I may then add something to this blog entry.

Issue Preclusion (Collateral Estoppel) in FBAR Civil Willful Penalty Suit After Criminal Conviction (3/3/21)

In United States v. Kerr (D. Ariz. 2:19-cv-05432-DJH dkt. 26 Order dated 3/1/21), TN here, the court granted the U.S. partial summary judgment in the FBAR civil willful penalty collection suit based on collateral estoppel (issue preclusion) from Kerr’s prior conviction for willfully failing to file FBARs.  The court held that the issue of Kerr’s willfulness had been determined in the criminal proceeding at a higher standard that included the lesser civil standard.  However, the court denied summary judgment with respect to one account, called a placeholder account, that was not among the accounts mentioned in the indictment for the counts of conviction.  The opinion is short, so I will not discuss further.

JAT Notes:

1.  Issue preclusion is term now generally used rather than collateral estoppel.  See Revised Terminology: Issue Preclusion Rather than Collateral Estoppel and Claim Preclusion Rather than Res Judicata (Federal Tax Procedure Blog 11/29/16), here.

2.  I have written before on issue preclusion on the FBAR willful penalty from the criminal conviction.  FBAR Collection Suit Against Person Convicted of Willfully Failing to File FBAR (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 12/11/18), here.

3. I have discussed tax crimes settings for issue preclusion (collateral estoppel) as to the civil fraud penalty from the criminal conviction.  Some of the posts are (reverse chronological order):

• Tax Court Again Rejects Collateral Estoppel For Some Deficiency and Civil Fraud Penalty Where No Tax is Due (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 7/24/16), here.
• Tax Evasion Conviction Does Not Compel a Finding of Deficiency Where There is No Deficiency (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 4/2/16), here.
• Civil Collateral Estoppel Following Tax Evasion Conviction (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 12/3/13), here.
• Hapless Mr. Williams Loses Again (Federal Tax Crimes Blog 12/5/12), here.

Supreme Court Opinion Uses “Cleaned Up” Technique for First Time (3/3/21)

 This morning’s NLJ Supreme Court Brief Email had this item (authored by Tony Mauro):  How SCOTUS Finally Got 'Cleaned Up.'  Mauro's article points to this quote from Justice Thomas' unanimous opinion in Brownback v. King, ___ U.S. ___, ___ S.Ct. ___, 2021 U.S. LEXIS 1198 (2021), here (emphasis supplied):

To “trigge[r] the doctrine of res judicata or claim preclusion” a judgment must be “‘on the merits.’” Semtek Int’l Inc. v. Lockheed Martin Corp., 531 U. S. 497, 502 (2001). Under that doctrine as it existed in 1946, a judgment is “on the merits” if the underlying decision “actually passes directly on the substance of a particular claim before the court.” Id., at 501–502 (cleaned up).

Focusing just on the bold-face sentence, here is the sentence from the Semtek opinion:  

The original connotation of an "on the merits" adjudication is one that actually "pass[es] directly on the substance of [a particular] claim" before the court.

The cleaned up quote looks much tidier and accessible to the reader than does the original in the Semtek opinion.  That is the point.

As explained in Mauro's article:

"The court's holding is the words that are used, not the punctuation," said Metzler, who promoted the phrase persistently on his widely-read Twitter feed Supreme Court Places and in an article published in the Journal of Appellate Practice and Process. In that article, Metzler complained that with the traditional clutter, citations "become an unwieldy mess packed with case cites and parenthetical information that tests the reader's ability to remember the point that the author was trying to make by using the quotation in the first place." Metzler is also the editor of previously unshared style guides of the Supreme Court and Solicitor General.

His campaign to propagate the phrase eventually caught on, and it found its way into all federal circuit courts. "We should welcome any effort to make judicial opinions more readable and accessible to every American citizen," said Judge James Ho of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, who has used the phrase. "To paraphrase my friends at the Green Bag, Citations should not look like goulash." Metzler's latest tally found that the phrase was used more than 5,000 times by lawyers and judges alike. But until last week, it never made it to the holy grail of the Supreme Court.

Recently, there had been hints that the high court was paying attention, Metzler said. Phrases like "quotation modified" or "quotation altered" were being used in Supreme Court decisions with the same purpose. Metzler wouldn't speculate on why "(cleaned up)" finally made it to the court and to Justice Clarence Thomas, who wrote the Brownback opinion.

But here is a guess: as of January 13, the Supreme Court has a new Reporter of Decisions named Rebecca Womeldorf. Part of her job is editing-or perhaps cleaning up-the court's opinions.

I have been using the cleaned up technique since I first learned of it from Bryan Garner’s Blog entry titled Law Prose Lesson 303: Cleaned Up Quotations and Citations (Bryan Garner Law Prose Blog June 2018), here.  Readers will recall that, for some time now, I explain the technique in a page link in the right hand column, titled Cleaning Up Quotes and Cites for Readability -- The "Cleaned Up" Technique, here.

Thanks Jack Metzler and thanks Justice Thomas.

This blog post is cross-posted on my Federal Tax Procedure Blog, here.