Rock v. United States

320 F. Supp. 3d 842
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Texas
DecidedJune 26, 2018
DocketCause No.: A–7–CV–00065–SS
StatusPublished

This text of 320 F. Supp. 3d 842 (Rock v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rock v. United States, 320 F. Supp. 3d 842 (W.D. Tex. 2018).

Opinion

SAM SPARKS, SENIOR UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

BE IT REMEMBERED on this day the Court reviewed the file in the above-styled case, and specifically the United States of America (the Government)'s Motion for Summary Judgment [# 56], Plaintiffs Robert Rock and Verree Rock's Response [# 60] in opposition, the Government's Reply [# 62] in support, and Plaintiffs' Sur-Reply [# 65-1]1 thereto, as well as Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment [# 58], the Government's Response [# 59] in opposition, and Plaintiffs' Reply [# 64] thereto. Having reviewed the documents, the governing law, and the file as a whole, the Court now enters the following opinion and orders.

Background2

This case is one of many tax cases relating to American Agri-Corp (AMCOR) partnerships of the 1980s. The AMCOR agricultural partnerships generally allowed partners to report significant losses on tax returns because "farming expenses typically exceeded any income realized from farming activities." Duffie v. United States , 600 F.3d 362, 367 (5th Cir. 2010). The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) began investigating AMCOR partnerships in the late 1980s "to determine whether they were impermissible tax shelters." Id.

I. Statutory Background

This case centers on the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 (TEFRA), which amended the Internal Revenue Code.3 A brief review of TEFRA is necessary to provide context for this decision.

A. TEFRA and Partnerships

In relevant part, TEFRA regulates the tax treatment of partnerships. As the United States Supreme Court has explained:

A partnership does not pay federal income taxes; instead, its taxable income and losses pass through to the partners. 26 U.S.C. § 701. A partnership must report its tax items on an information return, § 6031(a), and the partners must report their distributive shares of the partnership's tax items on their own individual returns, §§ 702, 704.

*846United States v. Woods , 571 U.S. 31, 134 S.Ct. 557, 562, 187 L.Ed.2d 472 (2013). Congress enacted TEFRA, in part, to provide the IRS with a method for correcting errors on a partnership's returns in a single, unified proceeding. Id. at 562-63. "TEFRA requires partnerships to file informational returns reflecting the partnership's income, gains, deductions, and credits. Individual partners then report their proportionate share of the items on their own tax returns." Rodgers v. United States , 843 F.3d 181, 184 (5th Cir. 2016) (quoting Irvine v. United States , 729 F.3d 455, 459 (5th Cir. 2013) ).

As an overarching framework, "TEFRA established three categories for items considered in the tax treatment of a partnership: partnership items, nonpartnership items, and affected items." Id. (citing 26 U.S.C. § 6231(a)(3)-(5) ) (internal quotation marks omitted). TEFRA defines a "partnership item" as "any item required to be taken into account for the partnership's taxable year under any provision of Subtitle A to the extent regulations prescribed by the Secretary provide that, for purposes of [subtitle F], such item is more appropriately determined at the partnership level than at the partner level." 26 U.S.C. § 6231(a)(3). TEFRA's corresponding regulations provided that items "more appropriately determined at the partnership level" include the gains, losses, deductions, and credits of a partnership. 26 C.F.R. § 301.6231(a)(3)-1. The term "partnership item" also "includes the accounting practices and the legal and factual determinations that underlie the determination of the amount, timing, and characterization of items of income, credit, gain, loss, deduction, etc." 26 C.F.R. § 301.6231(a)(3)-1(b).

By contrast, a "nonpartnership item" is "an item which is (or is treated as) not a partnership item." 26 U.S.C. § 6231(a)(4). "The tax treatment of nonpartnership items requires partner-specific determinations that must be made at the individual partner level." Duffie , 600 F.3d at 366. Finally, an "affected item" is "any item to the extent such item is affected by a partnership item." 26 U.S.C. § 6231(a)(5).

B. TEFRA Two-Stage Proceedings

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Bluebook (online)
320 F. Supp. 3d 842, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rock-v-united-states-txwd-2018.