He’s only been twice on this my blog heretofore, so I must apologize to Percy Squire, T. C. Memo. 2026-71, filed 8/19/26; btw, his firm, Percy Squire Co LLC, T. C. Memo. 2026-72, of even date herewith, shares the attention of Judge Tamara Ashford. Seems Percy and Co have a fifteen (count ’em, fifteen) year record in USTC, and Judge Ashford has ’em all. T. C. Memo. 2026-71, at p. 2, footnote 2. 

Turns out one of Percy’s cases I did blog eventually netted him a $5K Section 6673 frivolity chop, though I didn’t blog that outcome. See my blogpost “Tales of Suspense,” 1/3/20.

Percy is a wee bit casual about filing and paying his own income tax, and his firm’s FICA/FUTA/ITW. 

This time Percy stashed assets in an irrevocable trust, which ran his businesses and was behind on tax payments, soi his OIC was suspended until they caught up.

“We agree with respondent that petitioner has instituted these proceedings primarily for delay and has taken positions that are frivolous or groundless. As previously noted, see supra note 2, petitioner is no stranger to this Court; his Petition here is the seventh petition he has filed with the Court in the last approximately 15 years. In several of these prior actions (all of which are lien and/or levy actions) he has been warned not to file an offer-in-compromise solely to delay collection and that for an offer-in-compromise to be granted he must be current in his estimated tax payments. In one such prior case, he was sanctioned $5,000 pursuant to section 6673. Furthermore, in the instant proceedings petitioner has continued to press arguments that are irrelevant and to rely on documents that are not part of the stipulated record.

“The Court’s prior warnings and sanction appear to have left petitioner undeterred, despite his being an attorney admitted to practice before this Court. Accordingly, we will grant respondent’s Motion to Impose a Penalty and impose a penalty of $10,000 against petitioner pursuant to section 6673. Petitioner should realize that if in the future he continues to persist in litigation for the primary purpose of delaying the collection of his federal tax liabilities (on either his own behalf or Percy Squire Co.’s), then he will be communicating to the Court that a $10,000 penalty is insufficient to affect his behavior and that the Court should instead consider imposing a much larger penalty, up to the maximum of $25,000.” T. C. Memo. 2026-71, at p. 12. (Citation and footnote omitted).

Btw, Percy says ” I was unjustly suspended from the practice of law from 2011 through 2015.” T. C. 2026-71, at p. 4. This was in OH, before he was admitted to USTC. I’ll let you judge on that.

That phrase is “Stipulate, Don’t Capitulate”‘s little brother.  It means whatever document is thus referred to is included in whatever document you’re reading. And if you never got the document thus incorporated, you’re still signing on to it.

For James H. Ballengee and A.C. Heyde, T. C. Memo. 2026-73, filed 8/19/26, it means they’re stuck with their concessions to the FPAA, which negated deductibility of  their partnership NOLs because the debt giving rise thereto was nonrecourse and hence giving them insufficient inside basis to permit passthrough of NOL carryforwards.

Now before you TEFRA-canny ultra-sophisticates yell as if with a single voice  “old Section 6235(a)(1) partner-level factual affected item!” and inquire why no SND, Judge Adam B. (“Sport”) Landy will tell you.

James and A. C. signed individually, and James signed as manager of their box-checked LLC, Forms 870-LT, agreeing to all IRS’ slices-and-dices for two (count ’em ,two) of the years at issue (IRS folded the third). “Form 870–LT contained only the names of the partnerships, the names of petitioners, the years at issue, and a statement in the remarks: ‘See attached 870–LT Continuation Page.’” T. C. Memo. 2026-73, at p. 4.

The 870-LT Continuation Page said: “The accompanying Form 886–A, Explanation of Partnership Items and Partnership-Level Adjustments, is hereby incorporated by references.” Idem.

James and A. C. claim they never got the Form 886-A, which set forth the aforementioned slices-and-dices, and would have consulted their trusty CPAs, who handled the audit from which arose said Form 886-A, if they had. So James and A. C. claimed IRS misrepresented a material fact.

“Regardless of whether petitioners’ assertion that Form 886–A was not attached to Form 870–LT when they received and signed it is true, they have not shown that this was a deliberate or intentional attempt by the Commissioner to misrepresent any terms of the closing agreement. In addition, petitioners’ contention that there was a mutual mistake is insufficient to set aside the closing agreement because mutual mistake is not an enumerated ground for invalidating a closing agreement under section 7121(b). We determine that there is no misrepresentation of material fact and that petitioners executed a valid Form 870–LT waiver.” T. C. Memo. 2026-73, at p.13.

Form 870-LT is a complete waiver and closing agreement.

Now lest anyone think James and A. C. were innocents caught in an IRS squeeze play, Judge Sport Landy has some background.

“Petitioner James H. Ballengee received a bachelor of science in accounting from Louisiana State University; and although he is not currently licensed, he practiced as a certified public accountant (CPA) for five years at KPMG. After leaving KPMG, Mr. Ballengee founded and sold multiple companies in the oil and gas industry. Because of the nature of his work, Mr. Ballengee reviewed legal documents and frequently consulted with professionals, such as lawyers or CPAs, before executing said documents, as needed.” T. C. Memo. 2026-73, at p. 2.

Neither Hamlet’s immortal lament nor the protest of Andrew Tabaka, Chris Tabaka, Next Friend, T. C. Memo. 2026-70, filed 8/18/26, move Judge Albert G. (“Scholar Al”) Lauber. Chris pointed out that IRS had failed to credit the late Andrew with two (count ’em, two) payments made against the deficiency to which the late Andrew stiped out before he became the late Andrew. IRS had later corrected same, but still claimed interest from due date of return to paid in full. The case had gone to litigation prep before it settled out.

Judge Scholar Al applies ministerial and managerial, the Section 6404(e)(1) standbys, and finds IRS committed neither miscue.

“In short, the time that elapsed between April 16, 2018 (when the IRS first contacted petitioner in writing about the deficiency), and August 6, 2019 (when the Court issued the [stiped] Decision), was less than 16 months, including a trip to Appeals. Compared with the mine run of cases in this Court, petitioner’s case was resolved quite expeditiously. In any event, “[t]he mere passage of time in the litigation phase of a tax dispute does not establish error or delay” under section 6404(e).” T. C. Memo. 2026-70, at p. 6. (Citation omitted).

The only thing that took time was IRS getting information from third-party payors to substantiate the 1099-Rs at issue. Once the back-ups came in, the case settled.