Cedar Springs man indicted in tax case
Wednesday, April 25, 2007 By Barton DeitersThe Grand Rapids Press
GRAND RAPIDS -- A Cedar Springs man who allegedly spent years thumbing his nose at tax laws has landed in federal court for the second time in a week.
Robert Mosher was indicted Tuesday and faces 31 counts of illegal activity related to allegedly establishing false trusts used to hide $500,000 as of 2003, then ignoring a court order that he stop preparing tax returns for clients and himself, resulting in criminal contempt charges.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Donald A. Davis also accuses Mosher of tampering with witnesses, who also are former clients, telling one woman that "if anybody asks anything to anybody about (the trust), I know people who can put them away or make them disappear."
He allegedly told another former client, now a federal witness, it was illegal for him to cooperate with the government or to turn over any records, adding he "did not want to be the one caught talking."
Mosher also is accused of destroying evidence.
Mosher gained clients by telling them they were not required to pay taxes, and he knew this because he was a former IRS agent and police officer and was a certified public accountant, all of which was untrue, the indictment states.
Mosher also is accused of underreporting his own income between 2000 and 2004, saying he either suffered a loss for the year or earned less than $400, when in reality he had $24,000 and $125,000 in income each of those years.
The indictment claims Mosher tried to hide his income in false trusts starting in 1996 with M.E. Trust, followed in 1998 by the misspelled Tomarrow Trust, then Razzy Trust in 1999 and Mosher Enterprises Trust in 2000.
Mosher has been in and out of federal court on tax charges for nearly five years. In 2003, a federal judge ordered Mosher to stop selling tax shelters that had cost the U.S. Treasury millions of dollars. That ruling prohibited him from preparing tax returns and promoting any plan that encouraged people to illegally evade taxes.
Mosher is among those who claim the Internal Revenue Service has no constitutional right to collect income taxes and has incurred the wrath of more than one federal judge.
Last week, Mosher appeared in U.S. District Court before Judge Magistrate Joseph Scoville to demand the government provide him with an attorney who shared his views on tax laws. Scoville told him no such attorney was to be found, and he would have to either represent himself or take the lawyer the court assigns him.
Davis, the Department of Justice's "go-to guy" when it comes to dealing with tax protesters in West Michigan, said challenging the law has not been successful for these people.
"Many times, tax protesters want to argue the law, (but) it's not a defense to know what the law is and disagree with it," Davis said. "No one using that defense has ever been acquitted in this district."