IRS Knowingly Hired, Rehired Tax Cheats, Employees With ‘Performance’ Issues

Photo Credit: Washington Times By Stephen Dinan. The IRS rehired hundreds of employees who had prior records of bad performance at the agency, including 141 former workers who had botched their own tax returns and others who had used their positions to peek at private tax information, the agency’s inspector general said in a report released Thursday.

Five IRS employees were rehired even though the agency knew they had intentionally failed to file their taxes within the last two years, Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George said. Of the employees with prior problems, nearly 20 percent of them had more problems after they were rehired.

In another instance, an employee who has taken eight weeks of unauthorized vacation and whose previous manager had written a note explicitly stating “do not rehire,” was nonetheless rehired.

“Rehiring prior employees with known conduct and performance issues presents increased risk to the IRS and taxpayers,” Mr. George said.

Most rehired employees don’t have any problems, and the IRS does a good job of weeding out those with criminal records or history of drug use, but the agency doesn’t give much credence to the workers’ rule-breaking during their previous stints at the IRS. (Read more about how the IRS rehired tax cheats HERE)

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IRS Took Cash, Asked Questions Later

By Robert O’ Harrow Jr. The Internal Revenue Service has routinely seized bank accounts from individuals in recent years without proof of criminal wrongdoing — and only then asked the account owners about allegations of suspicious activity.

From 2005 to 2012, the IRS took almost a quarter-billion dollars in more than 2,500 cases, using authorities under federal asset forfeiture law. That’s the finding of a new study by the Institute for Justice, a libertarian-leaning civil liberties group. The group’s study, “Seize First, Question Later,” focuses on IRS enforcement of a law that prohibits “structuring,” a type of banking activity intended to launder ill-gotten money or hide the source of funds.

Civil asset forfeiture efforts by local, state and federal authorities have come under fire in recent months. Critics across the political spectrum say that civil seizures are often unfair and an abuse of police power. (Read more from this story HERE)

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