Eric F. Weiss Mary E. Weiss v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

In April 1984, the IRS determined deficiencies in Eric and Mary Weiss’s income tax and assessed additional taxes for 1976, 1977, and 1978. The Weisses petitioned the Tax Court for a redetermination and moved the Tax Court to suppress evidence derived from the IRS’s exercise of “institutional bad faith.” This institutional bad faith, which was found to exist by a district judge in a prior criminal prosecution based on the same facts, consisted at least in part of violations of internal agency regulations. However, IRS regulatory violations do not require the suppression of evidence. United States v. Caceres, 440 U.S. 741 , 99 S.Ct. 1465 , 59 L.Ed.2d 733 (1979). On the other hand, it is not clear whether evidence must be suppressed when statutory violations are involved, see Caceres, 440 U.S. at 755 & n. 21, 99 S.Ct. at 1473 & n. 21; United States v. Appoloney, 761 F.2d 520, 522-23 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 949 , 106 S.Ct. 348 , 88 L.Ed.2d 296 (1985); United States v. Snowadzki, 723 F.2d 1427, 1430-31 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 839 , 105 S.Ct. 140 , 83 L.Ed.2d 80 (1984), and the parties are in disagreement on whether the district court found that the IRS had…