Will I be charged with Tax Evasion?
The government just wants the most efficient way to get your money and you get punished with huge penalties anyway
Probably not. The government just wants the most efficient way to get your money and you get punished with huge penalties anyway. So why take years to punish, when you can get your slice of meat the easy way.
If the government thinks your case is a good one for publicity, they will determine it is in the public’s interest to prosecute you.
Charge Screening or the decision making process in determining if you will be charged with criminal tax evasion or not. How is the decision made?
Charge Screening is the activity of the Crown in determining if they should lay charges or not. Every charge has to be screened in accordance with the charge screening standards of “reasonable prospect of a conviction” as well as is it in the “public’s interest.”
Crown counsel is to screen every charge as soon as practicable after the charge arrives at the Crown’s office and prior to setting a date for preliminary hearing or trial.
Charge Screening is an ongoing process of examining new information as it is received by Crown counsel in preparation of and during the conduct of bail hearings, pre-trials, preliminary hearings, trials and appeals.
Crown counsel is to consider all new information in a continuous process of ensuring that cases that become probable losses of conviction are dropped.
In respect to Public Interest, it can only be considered after counsel determines that there is a probable conviction. No public interest is big enough to pursue prosecution solely for the purposes of publicity.
So, if there is a reasonable chance of conviction, then Crown counsel must then consider whether it is in the public interest to discontinue the action in spite of a probable win by the Crown.
What this means to me is Crown may drop a case where they believe they could win, because it would not be in the public’s interest. An example of what I would think would not be in the governments best interest, would be to pursue a criminal charge against critically ill single mother of six preteen children, who had unclaimed income on her tax return. Such a persecution would demonstrate that the government has no conscience and could cause embarrassment to the government.
I believe that there is also a risk management approach to the decision making process. For instance it would not be in the public’s interest to lose millions of dollars if the CRA is wrong in their assessment of tax debt.
It has been our experience that of late, hundreds of cases are dropped by the Department of Justice prior to going to trial as “Consent To Judgements.” What that means to me is that CRA must be railroading cases knowing that many people will just fold before actually going to court. In these cases it appears that it was not in the public’s best interest to go to trial and lose on all these hundreds of cases.
The secret to good risk management, is to get good help up front, before talking to CRA. You don’t need a lawyer, at least not in the beginning, not until there is a complete analysis of your case. This is where your TaxRep comes in.