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WESLEY SNIPES
Even lawyers representing Wesley Snipes in his 2008 tax trial admitted that some of the actor's ideas were "kooky," "crazy" and "dead wrong." But, they argued, Snipes did not break the law when he failed to pay taxes on $58 million of income.
In 1997, the actor quit paying taxes. He called himself a "nontaxpayer" in a document sent to the Internal Revenue Service, and he insisted the government refund him $7 million of taxes paid earlier. Snipes' courtroom defense was that he denied the legitimacy of U.S. tax law. Years earlier he joined the American Rights Litigators, a group that believes the 16th Amendment to the Constitution was fraudulently adopted. In fairness, a lot of Americans feel the same way about the amendment, which in 1913 gave Congress the "power to lay and collect taxes on income..."
Ever since the 16th was ratified there has been a cadre of citizens who have disputed its legitimacy. Courts have frowned on the argument, and they did so again at the Snipes trial, which became the most celebrated tax prosecution since "The Queen of Mean," Leona Helmsley, was convicted of tax evasion in 1989.
A jury found Snipes, who starred in dozens of films including "White Men Can't Jump" and the "Blade" series, guilty on three counts of failing to file tax returns. He was sentenced to three years in prison, but is currently free on bail as he appeals the verdict.
BORN:
July 31, 1962, Orlando, Florida
FAST FACT:
Besides his acting career, Snipes is a martial artist and film producer
Lori Branham
PETE ROSE
Pete Rose -- baseball's all-time hit leader and one-time shoo-in for the Hall of Fame -- makes his living these days autographing baseball memorabilia for about $50 a pop. He reportedly earns about $1 million a year from the part-time gig. But as Rose can tell you, signing baseballs isn't all about reliving the glory days with adoring fans.
In 1990, Rose pleaded guilty and was sentenced to five months in a minimum security prison for filing tax returns that omitted his income from those autograph sales. Rose was fined $50,000 and ordered to pay more than $360,000 in taxes and penalties. Lesson learned? Well, not quite.
In 2004, the IRS came knocking again. This time, Rose was hit with a federal tax lien of nearly $1 million. The government alleged that Rose owed taxes dating back to 1997. Still, the ballplayer once known as "Charlie Hustle" continues to trod the autograph circuit while he seeks to overturn the lifetime ban that has kept him out of the Hall of Fame.
BORN:
April 14, 1941, Cincinnati, Ohio
FAST FACT:
Rose is the all-time Major League leader in hits (4,256), games played (3,562), at-bats (14,053) and outs (10,328).
NASA
SPIRO AGNEW
Arguably the worst afternoon of Spiro Agnew's life was on an autumn Wednesday in 1973 when he uttered the words "I herby resign the office of the vice president of the United States," and then headed to a Baltimore courtroom to plead "nolo contendere" -- no contest -- to charges that he failed to report $29,500 of income in 1967 when he was Maryland's governor.
A personal appeal from Attorney General Elliot Richardson spared Agnew prison time. He was sentenced instead to three years probation and a $10,000 fine.
The legal upbraiding failed to dent Agnew's self-confidence -- some would say arrogance. He reemerged as a successful businessman and in 1980 wrote a book denying that he had ever taken bribes while a public servant. In 1981, however, he was found guilty in civil court of soliciting nearly $150,000 in bribes over 10 years and pocketing the last $17,500 while vice president.
BORN:
November 9, 1918, Baltimore, Maryland
FAST FACT:
Agnew is the only vice president to resign due to criminal charges
Istolethetv
DIONNE WARWICK
Billboard's Top 100 is a good list to land on. California's Top 10 ... not so good. Singer Dionne Warwick placed 3rd on this year's Franchise Tax Board annual list of California taxpayers with the largest delinquent bills.
According to the state's list, Warwick owes $2.2 million in taxes. She was reportedly working on a payment schedule when the 2009 list was released, but the latest tally shows no evidence of repayment.
Warwick, who popularized the song "Alfie" and sold over 1 million singles of "I Say a Little Prayer," is hardly the only celebrity to have made an appearance on the infamous list. O.J., Sinbad and Burt Reynolds have each popped up on the list of shame.
BORN:
December 12, 1940, East Orange, New Jersey
FAST FACT:
Warwick ranks as the 20th most popular hit-maker of the entire rock era (1955-1999), based on the Billboard Hot 100 Pop Singles Charts
Brian Guerra
WILLIE NELSON
If there's an upside to getting into hot water with the IRS, Willie Nelson found it. After protracted negotiations with the IRS on a tax bill that ran up to $16 million, Nelson got a gig with H&R Block hawking their tax advice services. His TV commercial, featuring a "Willie Nelson Advice Doll," got big laughs when it was debuted at the 2004 Super Bowl, and cemented Willie's reputation as tax rebel.
The episode was hardly all laughs for the country music legend, however. When the ordeal began in 1990, the IRS presented Nelson with a bill for nearly $17 million in back taxes and seized his bank accounts and property, including a country club Nelson owned near Austin, Texas. To help pay off the bill, Nelson released an album entitled "The IRS Tapes: Who'll Buy My Memories."
Nelson sued his accounting firm, Price Waterhouse, for giving him bad advice and blamed investments in questionable tax shelters for his woes. The suit was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount, and Nelson's tax bill repaid by the mid-1990s.
BORN:
April 30, 1933, Abbott, Texas
FAST FACT:
In 2007, Ben & Jerry's released a flavor called "Willie Nelson's Country Peach Cobbler Ice Cream"
Department of Justice
AL CAPONE
"Alphonse (Scarface) Capone, the fat boy from Brooklyn, was a Horatio Alger hero -- underworld version," the Associated Press wrote in its 1947 obituary of the notorious mobster.
Despite being linked to hundreds of killings, including the St. Valentine Day Massacre in 1929, it was the "comparatively sissy charge of evasion of income taxes," the AP wrote, that sent the king of the Chicago crime syndicate to the slammer.
Capone was sentenced to 11 years behind bars and fined $70,000 for failing to pay taxes on $215,000. On May 5, 1932, America's Public Enemy No. 1 entered Atlanta Prison, and two years later was transferred to "The Rock," Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay. Released early for good behavior in 1939, Capone was a weak and sickly shadow of his former self.
BORN:
January 17, 1899, Brooklyn, New York
FAST FACT:
Capone is one of the most notorious American gangsters known for smuggling, bootlegging and other illegal activities during the Prohibition Era of the 1920s and 1930s
JusticeForWalt.com
WALTER ANDERSON
By most accounts, the telecom entrepreneur Walter Anderson was an intensely private man with a keen interest in space travel and a proclivity to use aliases. But to the IRS, Anderson was America's No. 1 tax cheat.
Anderson was indicted in 2005 on charges that he failed to pay millions of dollars in federal and local taxes. Prosecutors said he used offshore corporations to disguise his ownership of companies that earned him hundreds of millions of dollars in the late 1990s. The government also contended that Anderson failed to file taxes from 1987 to 1993.
But in an interview with the Washington Post in 2005, Anderson rebutted the allegations and said the money he shipped offshore was intended for well meaning social programs -- family planning, human rights and arms control. "I don't intend to let the government ruin my credibility," he told the newspaper, echoing a theme he repeated before about government interference in people's lives.
In September 2006, Anderson pleaded guilty to tax evasion and fraud for failing to report approximately $365 million income earned between 1995 and 1999. On March 28, 2007, Anderson was sentenced to nine years in prison. He currently resides in a minimum security prison in New Jersey.
EARLY LIFE:
Anderson graduated Woodson High School in Fairfax, Virginia in 1971
FAST FACT:
began his telecommunications career as a salesman at MCI Communications in 1979
Police Mug Shot
HEIDI FLEISS
Heidi Fleiss, who started managing a prostitution ring when she was just 22, made millions providing Hollywood's rich and famous with high-class call-girls. So when the "Hollywood Madame" was arrested in a 1993 police sting, the news landed like a bombshell.
Ultimately, few of Fleiss's clients were revealed, but the madame paid a steep price. Prosecutors alleged that Fleiss laundered hundreds of thousands of dollars from her escort service through family bank accounts and a Beverly Hills home.
In 1997, Fleiss was sentenced to 37 months in a Federal prison for laundering money, conspiracy and cheating on her taxes. The woman who once ran the most exclusive escort service in Hollywood was also ordered to forfeit more than $500,000 from the sale of her Beverly Hills house and complete 300 hours of community service. In 2007, Fleiss opened a laundromat in Nevada called "Dirty Laundry."
BORN:
December 30, 1965, Los Angeles, California
FAST FACT:
In 2007 Fleiss opened a laundromat called "Dirty Laundry" in Pahrump, Nevada
APEC
TIMOTHY GEITHNER
Before becoming the top economic official of the United States, and, consequently the guy who oversees the Internal Revenue Service, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner tangled with a tax problem of his own.
In January 2009, Geithner looked likely to sail through the Senate confirmation hearings until it was revealed that he neglected to pay tens of thousands of dollars of Federal taxes from when he worked for the International Monetary Fund. With the country in the grip of the worst economic recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s, the Senate accepted Geithner's explanation for the tax indiscretion and confirmed him as Treasury Secretary on Jan. 26, 2009. He later paid $42,000 in missed taxes and interest.
Another of President Obama's cabinet nominees, former Sen. Tom Daschle, didn't fare quite as well. Daschle's carelessness with his tax returns -- he failed to pay more than $128,000 -- forced him to withdraw his nomination as secretary of Health and Human Services.
BORN:
August 18, 1961, Brooklyn, New York
FAST FACT:
Geithner spent his childhood in Zimbabwe, Zambia, India and Thailand
Robert Catalano and Police Mug Shot
DARRYL STRAWBERRY
Baseball's Darryl Strawberry has been a Dodger both on the field and off. In 1995, three days after being suspended from Major League Baseball and booted off the San Francisco Giants roster for using cocaine, Strawberry pleaded guilty to failing to pay taxes on income earned in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was ordered to pay over $400,000 in back taxes, plus penalties and interest, but he avoided jail time.
In October 2009, Strawberry's third wife, Tracy, told Newsday that the State of California contacted the former ballplayer regarding $260,000 in taxes the state is owed. She told the newspaper that Strawberry, who played four seasons in Los Angeles and San Francisco, has been steadily paying down his tax debts.
The slugger, who is best know for his his eight seasons with the New York Mets, has had more than his share of brushes with the law and unwanted celebrity status. Later this year, though, some of that may pay off. Strawberry is set to join several other tarnished stars on the NBC reality show "The Celebrity Apprentice." Sinbad, the comedian who has had tax issues of his own, and former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich are two other contestants who may benefit from Donald Trump's financial tutoring.
BORN:
March 12, 1962, Los Angeles, California
FAST FACT:
Strawberry helped the New York Mets reach the World Series in 1986 and the New York Yankees to three World Series championships in 1996, 1998 and 1999