Young Earth Creaionist Kent Hovind fought a long battle with the IRS that did not end well for him.  He served a long sentence for structuring, failing to pay payroll taxes and interfereing with the administration of the internal revenue laws.  There was also a large civil liability for unpaid taxes, including the civil fraud penalty. It is a complicated thicket of litigation, which I have covered pretty extensively.

To his followers and the right wing consipiracy bubble where his story goes unchallenged, he presents himself as an innocent man imprisoned for taking his own money out of the bank to pay his own bills.  As it happens it is possible to “innocently” violate the structuring laws.  All that is required is that you do your deposits and withdrawals in amounts under $10,000 with the purpose of avoiding bank currency reporting requirements.  Further there does seem to be an issue with Hovind’s structuring indictment.  Nonetheless there is the matter of the other things Hovind was convicted of and the civil liability making his narrative of just being a victim of the structuring laws seriously incomplete.

Since his release Kent has been going great guns on youtube and doing a lot of speaking.  He is raising money for a bigger better Dinosaur Adventureland in Alabama.

And he has been hinting about doing something to get his conviction overturned.  Bob Baty, who follows Kent, if you will excuse the expression, religiously, on his facebook site, had been writing about Kent’s “January Surprise” which even as of the end of February has not fully materialized.

Something has broken though, which indicates that we might be in for a March surprise.  Kent was speaking at the Slavic Baptist Church in Shakopee MN.  It is a long session and the news about his case does not come in till 2:40:37 in case you don’t want to invest the lifespan to see how well Kent’s jokes translate into Russian.  The discussion comes in the Q & A when someone asks him why he went to jail.

Apparently there will be an appeal on freekenthovind.com to sign a petition to have Kent’s case investigated.  With 5,000 signatures Kent’s conviction can be overturned and he will receive over $8 million.  I have no idea how that is supposed to work.  Kent indicated it will go up on the website in three weeks.

I asked one of my criminal law experts about the signature thing and he came up empty.

I asked Bob Baty for his thoughts on this drama and here is some of what wrote.

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Kent offers no insight into the actual details of how 5,000 whiners are going to actually affect the reversal of his convictions.  I may have an imagination, but I cannot imagine what he may be thinking in thinking 5,000 complaints will result in overturning, legally, as “we the people” determine such matters, his convictions.

Kent Hovind and his people have shown themselves very supportive of Ammon Bundy, Pete Santilli, and the others involved in the armed assault and takeover of the Malheur Refuge in Oregon.  Those people and Kent and his people share common false claims regarding the Constitution and have strong affections for such theologies as are associated with the “sovereign citizen” movement.

Sovereign citizen antics have already had to be dealt with in the Oregon cases and were ever present in Kent’s cases.

Some may recall that last year, Pete Santilli, prompted by Kent’s man Rudy Davis, made an attempt to threaten and intimidate Kent’s judge.  That call is archived around the 23:05 mark in the following broadcast by Pete Santilli:

At least one report in the coverage of the Oregon story indicated that Pete’s call to Judge Rodgers was still under investigation.  It may ultimately have some affect in Pete’s Oregon and Nevada legal matters as well as providing Kent with some publicity, though possibly not the kind he likes, regarding his case.

I am of the opinion that the Oregon case and current outcome have become a disappointment for Kent who was hoping to use that, as he has done with so many media stories, to try and piggyback his case into the national consciousness; or at least to milk his base for more money to fund his fantasies.

Had the Oregon case not developed as it has, Kent may well have executed his surprise in January as was earlier forecast, or February.  I am thinking he has had to revise his surprise and remove/limit certain sovereign citizen aspects; leaving him with some kind of “file a complaint for me, will ya?” fund-raising, media tempting program.

I have repeatedly challenged Kent Hovind to come out and discuss his legal problems, openly and honestly.  Over time I have developed 40 specific propositions for Kent’s consideration.  They can be found pinned to my Hovind dedicated FaceBook page

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It looks like we may not find out the full nature of the upcoming Hovindication campaign until late March.  Something to look forward as we wrap up another tax season.

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Peter Reilly CPA hopes to be the first tax blogger to give up his day job.