United States v. Jack I. Chikata

Appellant, a Seattle druggist, was convicted by a jury of income tax evasion, for the years 1961, ’62 and ’63. He was sentenced to a year and a day on each count, the sentences to run concurrently, and to pay a fine of $7,500.00 on each of the three counts, to be non-cumulative. He appeals. We affirm.

In January, 1966, a group supervisor of the Internal Revenue Service, when work was low, selected at random from the Seattle telephone directory, ten names of pharmacists. From the income tax returns of this group, he designated three for audit and assigned Robert Anderson, a revenue agent in the supervisory group, to make the audit. One so designated was appellant’s 1964 return, which showed a large amount of interest income compared to the reported business income. At this time, there was no thought of possible fraud, although the supervisor’s group was commonly known as the fraud group because approximately one-third of its work consisted of cooperating with special agents in criminal investigations.

Anderson, after receiving the returns, called appellant and told him of the assignment and that he wanted to see his books and records on the ’64 return. Appellant invited Anderson…