Earlier this month, as reported in the Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch, a Federal jury in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California acquitted Howard H. Berger, a business consultant, on four criminal tax charges. The charges stemmed from Mr. Berger’s alleged filing of 2006 personal and partnership tax returns allegedly claiming a false charitable donation of $1 million.
The defense at trial presented compelling evidence that Mr. Berger never personally reviewed or authorized his 2006 return. The compelling evidence was that, four days before the return was due in October of 2007, Mr. Berger’s ex-wife kidnapped their 4 year-old son from his preschool and fled with the child to her native country of South Africa. Furthermore, this was not the first time the former Mrs. Berger had abducted the child–she had refused to return to the U.S. after taking the child to visit her family in 2005. It took Mr. Berger 8 months working with the U.S. State Department to obtain a court order for the return of his son. The defense furthermore undermined the testimony of IRS agents regarding alleged false statements by Mr. Berger regarding his access to the charity’s bank accounts or statements.
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