UPDATE SEPTEMBER 19, 2015: SEE ALSO DISCLAIMER AND LITIGATION UPDATES.
[This post, which began in May and having over 1000 revisions and 2000 comments, is being retired from service and updates. It lived through the success of reaching a total of $500,000 in donations from our kind, dear supporters who had little money to give, the hope and disappointment with the summary trial decision, and the certainty that we are now finally moving on to the Charter trial.]
CANADIAN CHARTER TRIAL UPDATE:
— We have instructed the Arvay team to prepare for the “Constitutional-Charter” trial. This means that our focus now, as it was in the beginning of our lawsuit, is on the Charter trial.
Unless there is a new expense in the future that we have not anticipated, the monies from your donations will be sufficient to take us through the “constitutional-charter” trial in Federal Court. However, to pay other legal bills we will need additional donations from our supporters, and a request for donations will appear on another post soon.
OUR LITIGATION HISTORY:
One year ago, on August 11, 2014, Litigator Joseph Arvay filed a FATCA IGA lawsuit in Canada Federal Court on behalf of Plaintiffs Ginny and Gwen, the Alliance for the Defence of Canadian Sovereignty (en français), and all peoples.
Because of a Government delay we initiated a “summary trial”, using a portion of the arguments, which offered the possibility of preventing private banking information from being turned over to the IRS before September 30, 2015. See Alliance’s Claims, our Alliance blog, and AUGUST 4-5 SUMMARY TRIAL FILINGS in LITIGATION UPDATES.
US_Foreign_Person,
I absolutely love your innovative way of dealing with telephone scams — CRA, IRS or otherwise! Talk, baby, talk!!!
Quick, let’s recycle this Top Ten EmBee hit and use it while we can:
Chase away those blues – Donate: http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/
@ Bubblebustin and canoe
I don’t recognize those comments as the ones posted on Metro News. They look like comments from someone’s blog and I hope some of them remain buried in blogger oblivion. Ginny and Gwen are NOT first and foremost American. Their Canadian citizenship is NOT chopped liver.
EmBee @ US_Foreign_Person
I love your solution … wish I had a recording of your toddler’s toddler-speak to play back when those scam calls come in. It would have been handy when we were plagued by calls offering to fix up the windows computer we don’t have.
Re: CRA scam
My mother received a call from these scammers last month. Claimed they were from CRA and that my mother owed $1300. Caller told her that if she did not pay by 5pm, police would come and arrest her. She had the sense to hang up and call CRA directly. We noted that the call came from a 613 area code. I guess it’s part of their scam since a call from Ottawa looks legit. The caller had quite a thick Indian accent. My husband has a few Indian friends and knows a few cuss words in Hindi. We called this “CRA Scammer” back for a laugh and my hubbie gave him a few choice words in Hindi. Can’t recall exactly what my husband said, but I know it involved the man’s sister and a goat.
Wondering your number five should be number one.
@canoe … no that does not look like the same comment stream at all. For a start, MY comments are not there.
Deckard,
I had to look twice.
Your talents amaze me.
@Deckard, why the shiny FATCA website now? Because thar’s gold in them thar Canadian IGA hills. As the AMCHAM site once noted, the US tax compliance industrial complex is a growth industry in Canada and elsewhere outside the US. It is the new Klondike for prospectors – US tax law compliancers caught wind of a coming windfall back in 2011, and hitched up their wagons – immigrating to branch plants in Calgary and elsewhere from the US – and building a client base by pretending to provide a sympathetic professional ear and online advice to those desperately fearful and hungry for advice and an advocate here on IBS and elsewhere when the FBAR and FATCA fundraiser started to hit. Congress has spoken!!! The FATCA and CBT factory gears up to process all the minnows in Canada who haven’t been obeying the US overlords.
Strategy – solicit clients through ‘free’ webinars, build a client base, get recommendations via word of mouth, and build profile in the Canadian media as ‘expert’ to quote, move from one firm to another post with higher pay and profile – garner a huge raise in billing rate within a very short period of time. Open a US outpost to go with the Calgary one. Export US tax lawyers to Canada.
Canada is a conveniently located range of the second largest population of US taxable person/citizens outside the US, it is English speaking, within convenient commuting distance by air or even by car of the US homeland, already has taxpayer funded healthcare, and complicated economic, familiar, work and educational ties with the US as well as the longest shared border – that is why.
Easy for the import to return home to the US homeland when the time is right. Maybe get some lucrative post at the US Treasury in the US tax law revolving door between the private and government tax side?
Who knows, maybe next Secretary of the Treasury? Or after a gig as consultant to the Harper Con FATCApologists, advising the US FATCAnatics on the next iteration of the Canadian FATCA IGA and tax treaty – a gig that keeps on giving (gigging?).
Remember, FATCA is your friend – or as another compliancer has said “FATCA is not your enemy”.
: )
@ badger
Very astute comment and your word ammunition is accurately aimed. When all the little FATCA’d birdies are plucked up here in Canada, their nest eggs laid bare and gulped down by the US trained tax compliance condors (and the US Treasury), there will be yet another capital flight from here to there when the condors go back home to roost, taking with them nest eggs which were earned, taxed and saved in Canada.
I wonder who told Metro News to get rid of all the comments on their article on our court challenge. This proves the media is being told to shut up and don’t let the truth get out. That dutch youtube coverage has the “sanctions” word in it. The USA basically now runs the world.
Just checking in after a few days focusing on something other than IBS comments and FATCA.
So very glad to see the payment thermometer rising well and the amount due to our legal team down to a very minimal amount. BRAVO BROCKERS!!!
Once fully funded, we will need to know what the next goal needs to be – – for the inevitable appeal of the Summary Trial plus the Charter Challenge hearings in 2016. This is not a sprint but a Marathon and we MUST continue the effort as we are just at the beginning.. Looking forward to reading comments from anyone who gets/listens to the CD from the court. Also, very much looking forward to Judge Martineau’s ruling in mid-September.
I made a request for the CD last week, including a request to be post it on You Tube or the ADCS website. It must be approved by Justice Martineau and written consent is required to post publicly.
I spoke to a Federal Court employee about this last week. She was going to try to speak with Justice Martineau on Friday and then call; me. I did not hear from her so perhaps she was not able to speak to Justice Martineau. I will call again tomorrow.
She said she thought this may be the first time they have received a request to post on line.
I advised that even if written consent is not given to post online, I still would like the CD. Even that must be approved by the presiding judge.
nervousinvestor: Many thanks for reminding everyone about our complaint against the United States and its policies of CBT, FATCA and FBAR which was submitted to the UN Human Rights Commission a year and 9 days ago. Our last communication from the UN (May 2015) suggested that our case will be amongst those up for screening for acceptance into the UN complaints process at a week-long meeting that starts August 17, 2015. That’s TOMORROW! 🙂
Sometime after this coming week the UN will be notifying us as to whether or not our complaint has made the cut. Stay tuned!
@MuzzledNoMore
First the Summary Trial, then the UN Complaint, then the Bopp trial in Ohio, then Judge Martineau’s ruling. EXCITING TIMES INDEED!!!!! This ALL must get reported and circulated through the media. We can be SilentNoMore!!!
@NativeCanadian
I was told by the article’s author that Metro News was recently switched over to the Star’s website. I guess the comments were lost in the transition. This happened once before when the Squamish Chief made changes to its website, where a lot of really great comments in response to my letter to the editor there were also lost.
@Blaze
Thank you for your efforts in obtaining a CD of the summary trial, and obtaining the judge’s permission in making it public. Good luck!
@MuzzledNoMore
Your continuing hard work on the UN Human Rights Complaint is greatly appreciated!
150 CAN-Dollars closer to the target now (3rd donation).
@ ronny
Thank you for helping to make this possible. Every donation counts!
Tomorrow evening I am taking a flight over to Europe to catch a cruise. One of the Cruisecritic.com suggestions is that you bring a magnetic clip to put on the hall-side of your cabin door and hang something (so you can easily see, down the long hall, which is your cabin). I am taking a bunch of small sticky-notes and a bright yellow paper that says very simply “US Expats: Want to talk about FATCA?” With over 2000 folks on the ship, who knows what conversations this will spark! I will update in September…….
Also, August is Festival Season in Canada. One could get a small table or just walk up and down the crowds with a sign (with a similar written invitation as above) and handouts (with internet sites for them to explore) There WILL BE opportunities to spread the word!
Thank you @Blaze for requesting the CD of the proceedings; “…. including a request to be post it on You Tube or the ADCS website. It must be approved by Justice Martineau and written consent is required to post publicly.”
Justice must be SEEN to be done doesn’t it?
We are the taxpayers who are paying for these FATCA IGA FOLLIES in multiple ways ( as taxpayers – some of us to two countries, and also as accountholders, and many as donors to ADCS to try and get some justice).
We the public deserve to see the Con FATCApologists and their taxpayer paid lawyers (the entire apparatus of the Canadian justice dept.) in action as they try to defend stripping us of our equal rights as citizens and legal residents. This issue and their actions need public air and light. I want to SEE the dastardly actions and hear the betraying words for myself.
I am sure that it will be inconvenient anytime for light to be shone on yet another unconstitutional action of this government, and this collusion with a foreign power – the US, but this is a particularly good time for the proceedings to be accessible to the taxpaying public.
So ironic that the argument FATCApologists use invoke the concept of citizenship as “community membership” to justify US extraterritorial CBT, yet those defending FATCA do everything behind closed doors – wielding the power they ostensibly derive from us – and make agreements in the darkness of cabinet meetings and other halls of government, where citizens, residents and taxpayers cannot see what they are up to.
@LM, those are brilliant tactics!
The ADCS challenge and the very tangible hearing that just took place is giving me more ammunition to alert my fellows to FATCA and US extraterritorial CBT.
No one can disbelieve the very concreteness of this issue – ADCS has raised almost half a million dollars from ordinary people – no million/billionaires.
This helps with persuading people of the very real threat we face – a hearing has actually taken place in Canada, and the documents filed are online for all to see. Proof that we are not imagining this.
Bravo brave ADCS people!
Surgite!
@ronny
Thank u… hopefully we will finish off this amount today…. we have never been late before in our payments. It seems to me, people have given up or think they can hide from this terrible situation. There are 2 woman who are putting everything on the line to represent all of us, we should all do our part to make sure the payment is made.
If we do not stop this in its track, the US can/will add other injuries if we do not fight back. Many have tried calling, talking to gov’t representatives, writing letters, and many other different approaches. All we got was a pat on the head and nothing… The only way we can protect our future and privacy is doing what is being done… Legally force them to protect their citizens/residents.
As a Canadian representative in our gov’t has stated during the debate over this issue…. Congress has spoken…. I am Canadian… I have no congress… all I have is a gov’t full of traitors who don’t represent all Canadians… just their own interests… everything done is in secret or sneaking things into law. Canada has changed… not for the better… Enacting laws that violates our rights… we must show our gov’t… we will not bow down… we will fight as hard as we can to ensure our futures and our legal rights.
So please, please donate, even if its a few dollars… so we can pay off this amount and a check can be sent out Monday to pay the excellent lawyer who is working hard to ensure our rights….
Thanks, ronny. Another international (from Germany) donation to the Canadian litigation, which will hopefully lead to change for justice here in Canada and other countries around the world. We appreciate all three of your donations. Thanks, too, for the comment on your personal situation, that you have to deal with all of this in a language not your own and your question about any litigation in Germany. Unless someone else knows otherwise and answers, we / I know of none there at this point.
“…….it is not merely of some importance, but is of fundamental importance that justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.
Gordon Hewart 1870–1943: Rex v Sussex Justices, 9 November 1923″
cited from;
Oxford Treasury of Sayings and Quotations
By Susan Ratcliffe
” Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Martin Luther King
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_from_Birmingham_Jail
Donate NOW to the ADCS lawsuit against US extraterritorial FATCA in Canada – and via the domino effect, everywhere!
http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/DonateADCS.html
The government defense against the plaintiffs challenging FATCA here, and in the US would like to claim that the plaintiffs have not yet experienced any injury.
Let us revisit just one of the many many ways FATCA willfully inflicts harm on people like our plaintiffs under the IGAs. Again the issue of threat to the security of the data FATCA seeks to extract, collect and store is raised:
http://blogs.angloinfo.com/us-tax/2015/08/16/identity-protection-services-after-fatca-security-breaches-irs-generosity-knows-no-bounds/
“….Overseas Financial Accounts– Ripe for Security Breaches?
Americans abroad are particularly fearful of new security risks they face due to implementation of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, commonly called “FATCA.” Under FATCA, the personal financial information of US persons having accounts at foreign financial institutions is reported by the institutions directly, or through relevant home-country foreign government agencies, to the IRS. FATCA reporting includes the name, address and taxpayer identification number of each US account holder at the financial institution; the account number; account balance and value; the account’s gross receipts and gross withdrawals or payments; and other account related information requested by the IRS.
The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration has expressed concerns with the security of data transmission as mandated by FATCA. In September of 2014 the IRS issued a fraud alert to all international financial institutions that are complying with FATCA. Scam artists posing as the IRS have fraudulently solicited financial institutions seeking account holder identities as well as financial account information. Financial institutions directly registered to comply with FATCA, and those in jurisdictions that are treated as having an IGA in effect to implement the FATCA provisions through their home governments, have already been approached by parties impersonating themselves as the IRS. The IRS now has reports of incidents from various countries and continents.
Data Breaches and Identity Protection Services – Taxable by the IRS?
I believe it is just a matter of time before personal information mandated by the FATCA reporting rules will be compromised in a data breach. When that happens, one would hope that the relevant financial institution will step up to the plate and provide identity protection services to the victims. Such services typically include credit reporting and monitoring services, identity theft insurance policies, identity restoration services, or other similar services…”…..