Baldwin v. United States

The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's judgment in favor of taxpayers in their tax refund action. The panel held that the district court lacked the authority to hear this action because, as a prerequisite to bringing this action, taxpayers first had to file a timely claim for a refund with the IRS.The panel held that Treasury Regulation 301.7502-1(e)(2) provided the exclusive means to prove delivery, and recourse to the common law mailbox rule was no longer available. In this case, taxpayers relied on the common law mailbox rule to establish that the document was presumptively delivered to the IRS. Accordingly, the panel remanded with instructions to dismiss because taxpayers had not filed a timely claim for a refund with the IRS. The panel also reversed the award of litigation costs to taxpayers because they were no longer the prevailing party. View "Baldwin v. United States" on Justia Law