Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Lucrative world of IRS informant bounties

It’s attractive enough to have lured private equity money:

Three years ago, the I.R.S. began offering bigger rewards — 15 percent to 30 percent of whatever money the government recovered — in a move that has turbocharged the agency’s whistle-blower program. …

Among the lawyers, hedge funds and investors who may provide the financing for class-action lawsuits and whistle-blower cases against government contractors, the reinvigorated I.R.S. program has attracted attention.

[N.Y. Times]

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7 Comments

  • Does this seem wrong to anyone else?

    • By Joe

  • Hey, turn in your dad for fifteen percent of the take. Sounds good to me.

    Bob

  • I’m focusing my ratting talents on class action plaintiffs and attorneys.

  • I didn’t know it’s gone up from 10%. I may just switch businesses and become a full time bounty-hunter!

    • By Robert

  • Wow.

    Sounds like a stepping stone on the trendy new RED brick road being paved in our country – you know, the one that takes folks from long-term unemployed from private sector to eventual government cog (have you seen this? http://www.hsdent.com/blog/2010/05/24/all-roads-really-do-lead-to-washington/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HsDent+%28HS+Dent%29).

    Just looking at the numbers on food stamps and other government assistance these days, it may be that whistle-blowing could look pretty attractive to some. However, they might be wise to look at the guy who blew the whistle on all those Swiss bank account holders (avoiding taxes or something the American citizens might not have been the real “benefactors” of, something like that – I think it was featured on Democracy Now sometime last year…) and, rather than being rewarded, was promptly sent to prison!!

    Tristan Benz
    Maiden America

  • […] It seems the Senate-passed financial reform bill includes whistleblower bounties and other legal goodies. [Whistleblower Law Blog] On tax informants, see our post of Wednesday. […]

  • Sounds like good news for every bum in America. The informant business may become one of the last jobs for the hopeless and for 21st century treasure hunters. Hope you all get rich. I wouldn’t recommend informing on your mother and father if you still live at home. The math may turn out negative.

    • By adsum