I need the help of the collective minds here. My good friend will definitely need a tax attorney to deal with his problem, but I'm hoping to give him some idea of what he can expect, so that I can get him to do something about it.
Here's his story: he worked and paid taxes for a few years in the early 80s. He then developed a severe addiction to crack cocaine. He worked for several more years and managed to make good money, but didn't file taxes and was underwitholding. He then began living with a woman and helping her with her business so he had no reported income. He also spent time in jail as a result of his addiction.
Amazingly, he is now five years sober and doing great, but as you can imagine, it's a long process repairing the damage from all those years of addiction.
He's self employed and would like to start filing taxes but he's understandably concerned about opening that can of worms with the IRS.
I have no experience in this area, having always been a law abiding taxpayer. I think his best approach would be to employ a tax attorney who can plead on his behalf for some kind of amnesty or forbearance, and my guess is it would be better to come forward first than to wait for the IRS to finally catch up with him.
Anybody here with experience on either side of this coin? Advice?
