United States v. Joe S. Duncan and Michael M. Downing

MERRITT, Circuit Judge.

In this false statement tax case, defendant Duncan and defendant Downing, who was Duncan’s tax preparer, were acquitted for the tax year 1981 and convicted for the year 1982 of violating 26 U.S.C. §§ 7206(1) and 7206(2), which prohibit the making and the preparation of a tax return containing a false statement as to a material matter. The 1982 tax return in question contained two separate and distinct statements which the indictment alleged were false. The structure of the indictment and ambiguous instructions given by the judge in response to a question from the jury…