Legal Scholars Say
Government Regs. Led to Boston Shootings
By Sierra Times - Posted: 12.29.00 |
Government’s Warrantless Search &
Attempted Warrantless Seizure Leads to Shooting Rampage; Boston Again the
Scene of Tax Revolt; Legal Scholar Says Government Evasion of
Constitutional Requirements for Tax Searches and Seizures Led to Killings
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Reports indicate an employee of a Boston Internet consulting
firm shot and killed seven co-workers who apparently participated in plans
to honor warrantless government searches for and seizures of the
employee’s earnings, accrued and future. |
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The law, constitutional and statutory, requires a Fourth
Amendment warrant, executive or judicial, for tax searches and seizures,
but the IRS has routinely operated without them, provoking an outcry,
producing litigation, and fomenting office stress that has now resulted in
violence. "Without a valid warrant, no legally valid proof of a tax debt
exists," said Virginia L. Cropsey, J.D., a graduate of Wayne State
University School of Law and the University of Michigan, and author of an
Internet newsletter and new
website that expose the legal insufficiency
of IRS notices of levy. |
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"The Fourth Amendment accords protection to a person’s
"effects," Cropsey says, "and that includes a person’s accounts
receivable." The Fourth Amendment was inspired by the 1761 speech in
Boston against the writs of assistance by James Otis, an attorney engaged
by the merchants of Boston. British issuance of the writs of assistance,
which are similar to the current IRS "process" led to the Revolutionary
War. A young John Adams, later second President of the United States,
heard the Otis speech and was inspired to draft a provision, Article XIV,
for the 1780 Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, which later became the
basic language for the Fourth Amendment, Cropsey says. At the time of the
construction of the Bill of Rights, Richard Henry Lee, Senator from
Virginia, and an ancestor of Robert E. Lee, saw to it the word "effects"
rather than "possessions" was used in the Fourth Amendment, so that
accounts receivable, which would include the apparent shooter, Michael
McDermott’s earnings, have Fourth Amendment protection. This means, and
the 4th and 5th Amendment pre-judgment seizure case law shows, that a
warrant is required, according to Cropsey. Additionally, wages are special
property for purposes of pre-judgment seizure under the Supreme Court
decision in Sniadach v. Family Finance Corp. You can’t seize property for
taxes in this country pre-judgment without a sworn statement, says
Cropsey. "Certainly the government should have to swear the debt is owed
and demonstrate probable cause for these searches and seizures. The IRS
has no business writing your employer about you and interfering with your
employment relations without proper authorization." |
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Recently Cropsey showed that the Fourth Amendment’s "no
warrants" clause was intended by the Framers to require at a minimum, an
executive branch warrant for tax seizures. “I call it ‘all about
adjectives,’” said Cropsey. “I read the case law more carefully than most
attorneys, and noted that the Supreme Court said in its 1977 opinion in GM
Leasing that a judicial warrant was necessary for entry into private
premises for tax seizures. I knew from the plain language of the Fourth
Amendment, and from research I did on the 1762 case of Entick v.
Carrington & Three Other King’s Messengers, a British sedition case,
and from other research, that at least an executive branch warrant was
necessary for other tax seizures. I’m a bit like the kid in “6th Sense” –
I don’t see dead people, but I see something the others didn’t due to my
careful reading of the Fourth Amendment’s 'no warrants' clause – I see
executive branch warrants." |
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These executive branch warrants were held to be required for
federal tax seizures. Pre-1954 case law exposed in a 1998 opinion in
Williams v. Boulder Dam Credit Union by Clark County Nevada Magistrate
Victor Miller held the executive branch warrant is required, Cropsey says.
Cases concerning the issue of the warrant requirement are just beginning
to make their way through the courts, she says. In order to avoid a Fourth
Amendment test, the government does not cross the line and technically
seize the property; it has not been using the language obfuscated case law
says is required for seizure – "is seized and levied upon," according to
Cropsey, who says she spent over 1000 hours researching the issue and who
has 60 pages briefed on the subject in the Michigan Court of Appeals, as
well as on the question of whether private sector employers are required
to withhold wages without a signed wage withholding order in effect. "They
used quite a few standard legal tricks. It was a textbook case of stealthy
encroachment." The levy situation leaves banks and employers subject to
suit on contracts, and without a defense that they honored a levy under 26
U.S.C. 6331 & 6332 since no levy occurs, according to Cropsey.
Cropsey’s briefs show the pre-1954 case law was continued in effect by
Congress under the 1954 Code. Since then, a consumer snatch-back line of
cases in the Supreme Court makes clear that the Due Process clause of the
Fifth Amendment requires sworn statements for pre-judgment seizure. These
standards also apply to federal tax seizures according to the Supreme
Court, Cropsey says. |
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Cropsey says her research also shows future earnings aren’t
property under state law, and therefore under 26 U.S.C. Sec. 6331, the
federal tax levy statute, so the IRS cannot reach future earnings with
current levy process as they currently do. |
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"The situation is despicable; every member of Congress,
every President in modern times, bears responsibility for allowing this
situation to occur," she says, and encourages citizens to write Congress
and the President and demand the IRS obtain the warrants the Constitution
requires for tax searches and seizures. The warrant is critical to show
all the necessary procedures and laws have been complied with to allow the
government to seize the property, she says. "One judge stated he’d never
seen anything like what my research exposes in 23 years on the bench."
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"The IRS can’t get a warrant for these tax seizures because
no competent authority can swear the tax debt is due and owing. The
Constitution prohibits direct taxes without apportionment. The government
is avoiding a test of the Constitutionality of the income tax by not
technically seizing the property. It’s a double-end run of the
Constitution, one the framers Fourth Amendment language was written to
prevent, and one which must end immediately," Cropsey said. "The IRS has
engaged in a calculated campaign to intimidate attorneys, legislators and
others who should have reported this situation into silence – the
situation is grim." |
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The article submitted by Red Hen Resources - Troy,
Michigan |
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