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.
@Bubblebustin
I think a more accurate picture would be me sipping a Molson 67 as I pack my kids school lunches for the next day, while my husband mows the lawn surrounding our little subdivision house.
I haven’t read much from the pen of Petros for a long time … I hope that he is in good health.
She promised and she delivered. Victoria writes (brilliantly, as always) about ADCS …
http://thefranco-americanflophouse.blogspot.ca/2015/05/another-front-in-fight-against-fatca.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/mjljN+(The+Franco-American+Flophouse
Thank you, merci beaucoup and arigatoo (probably got that wrong) Victoria!
I just noticed on the DA facebook page they posted a response to their latest rebuke.They are obviously feeling the heat. I am going to go post on the thread hopefully others will as well. Have to hold them accountable for not doing anything to help us.
Thanks, Em. Sorry I didn’t get this one up sooner. I thought ADCS deserved its own post and so I didn’t include it with a previous one where I talked about SCE and the Bopp lawsuit. Next up (probably after the Frenchlings leave Japan) is the hunab rights complaint with the UN.
“Thank you” in Japanese is complicated and I always get it wrong. You can say “domo”, “arigato”, or “arigato goyzaimas.” I just stick with “arigato” for the most part and leave the rest to the only reasonably fluent Japanese speaker at the Flophouse, the younger Frenchling. 🙂
Victoria: Brilliant equation of FATCA with a census! Yes, that is truly what it is … a list of all those suspected of being Americans along with where they live. Great article, as always!
A tangent … but interesting. I am presently watching this. http://pro.moneymappress.com/MMRBS495LG/PMMRR4AH/?iris=360290&ad=wc-am-xu&h=true
I have been reading over the Memorandum of Fact several times now, chewing it over………
As a EUroBrocker, there was an initial sense of disappointment that this alternative route had come up because rightly it was felt that the worldwide application was limited. But in the alternative, I did give thanks that Joe Arvey may have found a path of relief for Canadian Brockers and I remain steadfast in the belief that relief for one is better than relief for none.
Having said all that and chewing and chewing……there are some very good points in this legal claim that may have use in the EU. We are fortunate that Pax-USA designed all their IGAs and Tax Treaties around a similar general template.
Though I remain of the core belief that the FATCA Dragon may be slain as a violation of human rights via the Charter which would be a shot heard round the world, I am now of the belief that that this Arvey Path does in fact create a very damaging blow to the FATCA Beast.
Even though the legal documents indicate further legal action might not be necessary, I now believe that is window dressing as in time a Government could create a new framework to revive the beast. The fatal blow will only come through a human rights violation.
@nervous investor
You asked “Who or what is the Institute for Justice ? who took on this case pro bono ?”
Their website is here: https://www.ij.org if you want to explore it.
One major area of justice that they pursue is in the area of civil forfeiture. If the government alleges that a property is being used for drugs, the “property” can claimed by the government, even when the owner is not accused of a crime. Also, if the small business has used only small cash deposits under $10K, that also allows them to seize the bank accounts. Here are short videos of cases that the Institute for Justice has taken on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJrM44GwiTg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGtFWC-12-w&list=PLCE9EF147C3C7C3AA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwN-uFCtXPs
Just came across this on some of the other pages. The US Supreme Court just ruled it unconstitutional for a state to tax an individual who already pays tax to another state. No double taxation allowed. Hmmm, sounds familiar.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/supreme-court-rules-maryland-income-tax-law-is-unconstitutional/2015/05/18/1e92ee7a-d16f-11e4-ab77-9646eea6a4c7_story.html
In honour of Canadian Finance Minister Joe Oliver’s 75th birthday, I just donated $75.
Let’s give Minister Oliver the gift of our lawsuit, Please donate.
I’ll second that motion with a donation as well!
@ Blaze
I can spare 7 purples and 1 blue for Joey’s birthday too. I’ll send them off this afternoon.
I donate because I don’t want to find myself on this website three, four, five years from now opining over Canada’s implementation of FATCA, the Foreign Account Tax COLLECTION Act.
“Last week I spoke to US attorney Jim Bopp and estimate roughly that in about a month Republicans Overseas Action Inc will finally file their kill-all-of-FATCA-now lawsuit in the United States. I am a believer in litigation to kill bad laws that cause harm. On the other hand, some might prefer the Democrat Party tweak-FATCA political-legislative approach to our litigation:”
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, the United States did not respond by suing the Japanese Government under Japanese laws in a Japanese court or by lobbying the Japanese Parliament. In the case at bar, the sovereignty of Canad is at stake and the Canadian Government can solve the problem by not participating in the problem.
@Jan
Thank you so much for those links re Civil Forfeiture …. gosh what a nasty situation. Talk about Government gone off the rails.
I hope other countries residents come to the realisation that it would be in all our best interests to file more lawsuits all over the world in Supreme Courts.
Make a world appeal to get this disgrace of a law part of history.
WTF is with the Brits? You people have no problem making your injustices known but yet
None of has had the balls to step up and do something in Britain. Instead you have a prime minister who was more than happy to bend over and spread his buns for the U.S. Treasury so willingly. The cost to the UK taxpayer was and will continue to be enormous. No other duAls other than Boris Johnson? Winston Churchill never would have stood for this. He would have chugged down a bottle of his best liquor and kicked every US legislators ass up and down the capitol steps until he/she came to their senses.
@TomAlciere
re: “When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, the United States did not respond by suing the Japanese Government under Japanese laws in a Japanese court or by lobbying the Japanese Parliament. In the case at bar, the sovereignty of Canad is at stake and the Canadian Government can solve the problem by not participating in the problem. ”
True that. Just say ‘no’. Who gives a crap what laws a foreign country makes? We don’t have to play along.
Currently, Canadians (and people of any other citizenry) residing outside the USA, who are deemed as USA’s persons, fear CBT.
If CBT gets struck down within the USA, who knows what other laws USA could enact in future that apply to ‘its persons’?
Canada (and all other countries) need a strong defense to repel ANY such laws that US might dream up to torture its ‘US persons’ who are citizens and residents of the countries they call home.
This is why it is important to donate to this Canadian lawsuit which if won, will help to strengthen Canada’s defenses against foreign, extraterritorial laws, and will set an example for all other countries to follow.
@WhiteCat
Nobody knows what the US will do in the future, that is one of the reason that I renounced. I refuse to live my life subject to the whims of a foreign government. And as long as I was an American I would have that hanging over me.
But now I am free and I have no regrets.
I was just thinking of an analogy regarding the necessity of having a strong Canadian defense against foreign laws. Our body’s immune system is always on the lookout for an invader. It is important that it be able to detect and attack a wide variety of pathogens, from viruses to parasitic worms. We can’t eradicate every pathogen which has the possibility of causing harm to us, but we can work at keeping our immune systems as healthy as possible to increase our chances of warding off potential illnesses.
Keep Canada healthy! Show other countries how this can be done.
Donate to the Canadian FATCA IGA lawsuit today!
@Just a Canadian, “But now I am free and I have no regrets.”
You are never free of the United States, never.
So I noticed that a request is being made for people to attend the hearing in Vancouver in August.
This does raise an obvious question though for those who live quite a ways away from Vancouver: if someone had, say, $1,000 and they could spend that money either on making it to Vancouver–or on donating but not making the trip–which should they do?
Given the physical distances involved in travelling within Canada–and the fact that many donors are small pocketed with finite resources–it might be good to be clear which is the higher priority.
@Dash172
So I noticed that a request is being made for people to attend the hearing in Vancouver in August.
where did you notice this request?
I live about an hour outside of Vancouver and was planning on making the trip at least for the first day to show support for the cause
@mettleman
Today’s update at the top of this post says:
AUGUST 4-5 TRIAL UPDATE — PLEASE COME TO VANCOUVER:…So I ask that all supporters who can somehow make it to Vancouver to try to be there for the August 4-5 trial.
For someone living an hour away the costs are presumably relatively negligible. For me in Seattle it is still relatively cheap but I would probably take a puddle hopper flight up to Vancouver and stay in a hotel. I find it–comparatively–less stressful to cross the border by plane–and more stressful by land–so prefer to fly–a manifestation of the deteriorating cross border culture of which this lawsuit is another manifestation.