“Only the little people pay taxes.”

That was the famous quote attributed to the billionaire real estate mogul Leona Helmsley. I'm sure many of you remember her.

She was also dubbed “The Queen of Mean” due to her tyrannical behavior with those she considered not worthy of her attention … virtually everyone except her beloved dog, “Trouble”. When she died in 2007 she left a good portion of her wealth to him !

I was reminded of Ms. Helmsley this morning while perusing the political news. She was accused (and thankfully convicted) of non-payment to contractors and using fraudulent means to evade paying taxes. A favorite scheme was insisting that the contractors falsify their invoices to read as business expenses billed to her hotels to avoid paying tax liabilities. 

In 1988 then United States Attorney Rudy Giuliani indicted the Helmsleys and two of their associates on several tax-related charges, as well as extortion. After a lengthy trial she was finally convicted of one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, three counts of tax evasion, three counts of filing false personal tax returns, sixteen counts of assisting in the filing of false corporate and partnership tax returns, and ten counts of mail fraud … but acquitted of extortion. She was sentenced to 16 years in prison but with the aid of her attorney Alan Dershowitz she was released in 1994 after serving just 19 months.

I never realized that Rudy Giuliani (a staunch supporter of our current Republican presidential candidate) was so knowledgeable about the inner workings of the tax laws as it pertains to real estate in our country. He must know every trick in that trade that is used to evade paying taxes so I'm surprised that he hasn't advised his good friend to reveal his tax returns. After all, if they do nothing more than show the unfairness of the tax laws we will at least know, once and for all, that “only the little people pay taxes”.  THAT'S US !!!