![\"David](\"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/David_Vocatura.jpg\")
<\/a>David Vocatura<\/p><\/div>\n
It was not uncommon for David Vocatura or other family members to make cash deposits at their bank \u2013 many customers at Vocatura\u2019s Bakery, a nearly 100-year-old community institution, paid cash.<\/p>\n
But it was those deposits in amounts under $10,000 that drew the attention of the Internal Revenue Service three years ago and put the family through legal hell \u2013 and, despite some good news this week, that hell is not over.<\/p>\n
The 2013 IRS raid on the Norwich, Connecticut, family business resulted in the agency seizing $68,000 from the Vocaturas\u2019 bank account under civil asset-forfeiture procedures. For three years the IRS pressured David and his brother to plead guilty to criminal charges of \u201cstructuring\u201d bank deposits and to agree to surrender the money. They refused.<\/p>\n
In retaliation for their refusal, the agency then launched a criminal tax investigation of their business, requiring them to account for nearly every financial transaction over an eight-year-period. That\u2019s when the Vocatura\u2019s took the IRS to court.<\/p>\n
Grover Norquist takes down the IRS in \u201cEnd the IRS Before It Ends Us.\u201d<\/b><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n On Tuesday, just hours after Vocatura\u2019s Bakery and the Institute for Justice sued the IRS to get the money back, the IRS announced it would return all of the money but is continuing with its retaliatory tax investigation.<\/p>\n \u201cThree years after taking the Vocaturas\u2019 money and forcing them into a prolonged legal nightmare, the IRS is still desperately searching for some way to retroactively justify the seizure,\u201d said IJ attorney Robert Everett Johnson, who is representing Vocatura\u2019s Bakery.<\/p>\n \u201cThe IRS should not be launching a fishing expedition into eight years of a business\u2019s financial records just because the owners will not voluntarily agree to forfeiture of their money.\u201d<\/p>\n So-called structuring laws were intended to target real criminals laundering illicit cash, not the entire bank accounts of legitimate businesses. Despite an October 2014 change in IRS policies that was supposed to prevent what has been done to the Vocaturas, the agency has continued pressuring the family.<\/p>\n But in the three years since seizing the business\u2019 assets, federal prosecutors never brought their case before a judge, instead pressuring the owners to agree to a \u201cvoluntary\u201d forfeiture. In February, the two Vocatura brothers were presented with a plea agreement that required they plead guilty to criminal structuring, accept a three-to-four year prison sentence, forfeit the original $68,000 and surrender an additional $160,000 worth of personal assets. Their refusal sparked the demand for eight-years worth of business records.<\/p>\n \u201cWe finally got our money back, and now we just want the government to leave us alone,\u201d said David Vocatura. \u201cThe last three years have been the longest of my life, and all because of how we deposited our money in the bank. Now we feel like the government just refuses to let us go.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis is yet another example of prosecutors using strong-arm tactics to threaten forfeiture victims with prosecution and jail time in order to pressure them to surrender their property in a plea deal,\u201d said IJ attorney Dan Alban. \u201cThe government threatened the Vocaturas with an investigation if they refused to give up their money. The Vocaturas refused anyway, and now the government is carrying through with that threat.\u201d<\/p>\n Congress is currently in the process of reviewing the IRS\u2019 use of civil forfeiture. The House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee held a hearing Wednesday on \u201cprotecting small businesses from IRS abuse.\u201d<\/p>\n That hearing followed up on a February hearing on the agency\u2019s use of forfeiture to seize assets from small businesses accused of money laundering. To avoid complicated bank-reporting requirements, some businesses made deposits of just under $10,000, but then found themselves charged with criminal \u201cstructuring\u201d of their transactions, resulting in accounts being seized by the IRS.<\/p>\n