The Government Has Focused a Considerable Amount of Energy To Prosecute Taxpayers Who Failed to File FBAR Reports and Accurately Account For Taxes. The Government has used the Required Records Doctrine to compel taxpayers to produce foreign bank account records.
Archives Feb. 11, 2017
The Fifth Amendment Does Not Protect Taxpayers From Being Forced to Produce Certain Required Records
Written by on in Criminal Tax Cases.
The Fifth Amendment protects individual taxpayers from being compelled to testify when such testimony is incriminating. This rule has been held to apply to the records in the custody and control of the taxpayer. However, when the taxpayer is required to maintain the records for non-law enforcement reasons that are public in nature, the Required Records Doctrine authorizes the government to subpoena such records. This is recognized as an exception to the Fifth Amendment.
