United States v. Hughes

District Court, N.D. California·Decided October 13, 2021·No. 3:18-cv-05931·Unknown

Opinion

1 2 3 4 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 5 NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 6 7 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Case No. 18-cv-05931-JCS

8 Plaintiff, FINDINGS OF FACT AND 9 v. CONCLUSIONS OF LAW REGARDING WILLFULNESS 10 TIMBERLY E. HUGHES,

Defendants. 11

12 13 I. INTRODUCTION 14 1. Plaintiff the United States of America brought this action seeking to enforce civil 15 penalties against Defendant Timberly Hughes, pro se, for failure to report foreign bank accounts 16 by filing a report commonly known as an “FBAR.” The Court held a bench trial by 17 videoconference on June 8 and 9, 2021.1 18 2. This document addresses the facts of the case and the question of whether the 19 United States has shown “willful” violations of the Bank Secrecy Act’s requirement to file 20 FBARs. Any challenge to the penalty assessed by the United States for such violations is reserved 21 for resolution after further briefing. 22 3. For the reasons discussed below, the Court finds that Hughes’s failure to file 23 FBARs in 2012 and 2013 was “willful” within the meaning of the statute, but that the United 24 States has not shown willfulness as to her failure to file FBARs in 2010 and 2011. 25 4. The Court finds the following facts by the preponderance of the evidence and 26 makes the following conclusions of law under Rule 52(a)(1) of the Federal Rules of Civil 27 1 Procedure. To the extent that any finding of fact is better characterized as a conclusion of law, or 2 any conclusion of law is better characterized as a finding of fact, the Court adopts it as such. 3 5. The parties shall file either a stipulation or separate proposed schedules for briefing 4 the issue of penalties no later than October 27, 2021. 5 II. FINDINGS OF FACT 6 A. Stipulated Facts 7 6. The facts in this subsection are taken directly from paragraphs 1 through 30 of the 8 United States’ proposed pretrial order (dkt. 132). The parties stipulated to these facts at the 9 pretrial conference. See Civil Minute Order (dkt. 147). 10 7. Ms. Hughes was born in the state of Nevada in 1964. She has been a U.S. Citizen 11 since birth. She presently possesses a U.S. passport. 12 8. Ms. Hughes earned her undergraduate degree in 1986 from Gonzaga University in 13 Spokane, Washington. She earned a Bachelor of Business Administration (B.B.A.) degree with a 14 major in International Business and a minor in Political Science. 15 9. From approximately January 1987 to August of 1987, Ms. Hughes sold ad space 16 for a phone book publisher in Anacortes, Washington. 17 10. In September 1987, Ms. Hughes moved to San Francisco to work as an assistant at 18 Metro Park, a parking facility company, where she did all the administrative work for one of the 19 principals, primarily processing claims for damage to cars that were parked in the facilities. 20 11. Ms. Hughes left Metro Park to work at Security Pacific Capital Leasing, where she 21 worked as an administrative assistant for about 6 or 7 months. Next, she worked at Rodde 22 McNellis in 1989, a real estate development firm specializing in strip malls and commercial real 23 estate. 24 12. At Rodde McNellis, Ms. Hughes’ job responsibilities included writing checks to 25 pay bills relating to managing the commercial real estate, such as utilities, garbage, water, 26 mortgage payments, real estate taxes and insurance 27 13. By 1991, Ms. Hughes transitioned to a role as an independent contractor with 1 bookkeeper at Rodde McNellis. 2 14. That same year, she started Hughes Bookkeeping Company. Her first clients 3 included Rodde McNellis, as well as a real estate broker who shared office space with Rodde 4 McNellis. 5 15. Ms. Hughes grew her bookkeeping business answering part-time bookkeeping ads, 6 and from word of mouth referrals. As a bookkeeper, she prepared the accounts payable and check 7 registers for businesses and gathered documents necessary for tax return preparation. She would 8 provide the client’s documents to the client’s CPA for tax return preparation. 9 16. In 1991 she began to work with the CPA firm Seiler LLP, having been introduced 10 to them by one of her first clients. 11 17. In 1991 or 1992 Seiler asked Ms. Hughes to work with Claude and Louise 12 Rosenberg to provide bookkeeping services for the family and work closely with the couple’s tax 13 attorneys and tax people. 14 18. Ms. Hughes would pay all of the Rosenbergs’ bills and kept track of payments in a 15 ledger that she would submit to the Rosenbergs’ CPA at Seiler every month. 16 19. Claude and Louise Rosenberg owned many properties through a revocable trust. 17 The revocable trust was also a partner in 97 partnerships and had a number of brokerage accounts. 18 Ms. Hughes would organize and keep track of tax-related documents for each of the trust’s 19 partnerships, including Forms K-1. Ms. Hughes also kept track of property tax statements for 20 properties Claude and Louise Rosenberg owned through the trust. She would follow up with 21 partnerships to obtain missing K-1s and convey the documents to the CPAs at Seiler & Co. for tax 22 return preparation. 23 20. As a personal bookkeeper for Claude and Louise Rosenberg, Ms. Hughes also kept 24 track of paying personal bills, including household utilities, household help, credit card bills, and 25 expenses related to the Rosenbergs’ children and grandchildren. 26 21. She provided bookkeeping services for the revocable trust after the deaths of 27 Claude Rosenberg (2008), and Louise Rosenberg (2010), and saw a significant increase in her 1 children informed of the trust’s operations. 2 22. The assets in the Rosenbergs’ revocable trust exceeded one billion dollars in value 3 at the time of Louise Rosenberg’s death in 2010. 4 23. Ms. Hughes did not prepare tax returns for the Rosenbergs, but she did prepare tax 5 returns for her own mother, sisters, brothers and approximately three to five friends over the 6 years.2 7 24. Ms. Hughes used TurboTax to prepare tax returns for herself and others. Prior to 8 using TurboTax, Ms. Hughes would fill out tax returns by hand. She obtained blank copies of tax 9 forms from the IRS by mail, and on at least one occasion, visited the Federal Building in San 10 Francisco to pick up copies of blank tax forms to fill out by hand for her family and friends 11 25. For the years 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013, Ms. Hughes purchased TurboTax CDs to 12 use for preparing her own tax returns. 13 26. In 2001, Ms. Hughes formed Akaroa Convention Centre (2000) Limited in New 14 Zealand. In 2003, the name of this entity was changed to Akaroa Winery Limited. Subsequently, 15 in 2005, the name of the entity was changed to Takamatua Valley Vineyards Limited (“TVV” or 16 “Takamatua”). From inception, Ms. Hughes has been TVV’s sole owner and director. TVV is 17 located in Akaroa, New Zealand. 18 27. On September 17, 2013, Ms. Hughes formed Cuba Uncorked Limited (“CU”) in 19 New Zealand. CU operated a wine bar in Wellington, New Zealand that is now closed. CU is 20 solely owned by Ms. Hughes. 21 28. As sole owner of TVV and CU, Ms. Hughes had a financial interest in, and 22 signature authority over, TVV’s and CU’s bank accounts at ANZ Bank New Zealand Limited for 23 each of the following years: 24 Year Account Name Account numbers ending in 25 2010 Takamatua Valley Vineyards (TVV) -1000, -1004, -0600, -0625 26

27 2 At trial, the United States acknowledged that the tax returns that Hughes prepared for others 1 2011 Takamatua Valley Vineyards (TVV) -1005, -1000, -1004, -1006, -0600, -0625 2 2012 Takamatua Valley Vineyards (TVV) -1005, -1000, -1004, -1006, -0600, -0625 3 2013 Takamatua Valley Vineyards (TVV) -1005, -1000, -1004, -1006, -0600, -0625 4 Cuba Uncorked (CU) -4400 5 6 29. During each of the years at issue, the aggregate value of the financial accounts at 7 ANZ Bank exceeded $10,000 in U.S. currency, and Ms. Hughes was required to timely file an 8 FBAR for each of the years at issue in this action. 9 30.

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