Opportunity to Comment on Proposed DOJ Rule Titled "Review of State Bar Complaints and Allegations Against Department of Justice Attorneys" (3/11/26)

A DOJ Tax Alumnus forwarded me the information below about an opportunity for Alumni to make comments to the proposed  DOJ rule titled "Review of State Bar Complaints and Allegations Against Department of Justice Attorneys." The proposed rule on the Federal Register is here. 

According to the Justice Connection podcast, the effect of the rule is to "block State Bar Ethics Investigations" of DOJ attorneys.  See the Justice Connection podcast titled “AG Bondi's Attempt to Block State Bar Ethics Investigations: A Discussion with Stacey Young & Glenn Kirschner,” here.

Comments are due before the April 6 deadline.

Comments can be made here.

 The Federal Register notice of the rule indicates that, as of the time I am writing this blog on 3/11/26 at 8:00pm, 27,588 comments have been received.) There is a link on the page (upper right) to view posted comments; that link is here.

DOJ Tax Division Alumni Reunion-Notice and Registration (2/23/26)

 

Save the Date for the DOJ Tax Division Alumni Reunion on Friday, May 8 from 4:00 - 7:00 p.m. at Miller & Chevalier Chartered

Picking up on the tradition in place for many years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, please save the date for a reunion of the DOJ Tax Division to be held on Friday, May 8, 2026, coinciding with the ABA Tax Section's May Meeting in Washington, DC. The reunion will be hosted at the offices of Miller & Chevalier Chartered, 900 16th Street, NW.

DOJ Tax Division alumni have cherished memories of time spent in the Tax Division – the comrades, the work, the opportunities. That important work continues apace at the tax branches of the DOJ Civil and Criminal Divisions.

For Tax Division alumni and those at the tax branches able to attend, please register using the link below. To cover catering costs, we ask attendees to contribute $50 toward the event. Payment details will be provided to all registrants. Space is limited, so please do not register unless you will be able to attend.

We're looking forward to another great reunion.

Register here: https://bit.ly/4aBs4TG

After registering at the link above, you will receive an email acknowledging registration and with instructions for payment. Please be patient about the email, because the emails are sent out periodically rather than immediately upon registering.

Alumni Planning Committee

▪️ Lauren Darwit, Moore Tax Law Group; former Trial Attorney, Civil Trial Section Central
▪️ Michael Desmond, Miller & Chevalier Chartered; former Trial Attorney, Civil Trial Section Western
▪️ Patrick Mullarkey, former Chief, Civil Trial Section Northern
▪️ Jack Townsend, former Trial Attorney, Tax Division Refund Trial Section 2 and Tax Division Appellate Section

Death of Joseph Salus (2/16/26)

Joseph Salus II died on February 13. The obituary from WAPO is here. The portion of the obituary on the Tax Division and related career is:

Joe had a long, illustrious career as a "supergrade" (now, SES) trial attorney (tax) at the U.S. Department of Treasury, IRS Office of the Chief Counsel and then at the U.S. Department of Justice, Criminal Tax Division. He held temporary assignments at the U.S. Department of State, where he negotiated Mutual Assistance (Tax) Agreement treaties. A lifelong true Republican, Joe famously took on Richard M. Nixon in a tax-related case.

It is not clear whether the Nixon “tax-related case” was while he was with DOJ Tax or with the IRS. If anyone recalls the story behind that cryptic comment, please tell the story in a comment below or email it to me (jack@tjtaxlaw.com) and state whether I have permission to post as a comment on this blog entry and identify the source.

Death of Mike Durney (1/11/26; 1/16/26)

I received an email from Roger Olsen advising that Mike Durney died yesterday, 1/10/26. He received the information from Mike’s daughter. Updated 1/16/26 @ 3:00pm: The obtuary is here. The obituary indicates that service will be held 2/7/26 @ 11:00am at St. Patricks Episcopal Church, 4700 Whitehaven Pkwy NW, Washington, DC 20007.

My database indicates that Mike's service with DOJ Tax was

TAX DIV ALUMNI SECTIONS

SECTION	POSITION	BEGYEAR	ENDYEAR
FRONT OFFICE	DEP A.A.G, ACTING A.A.G	1986	1988
REFUND 3	TRIAL ATTORNEY	1968	1972

Mike was predeceased by his wife, Ann Belanger Durney, longtime DOJ Tax Appellate attorney, who died in October 2001.

Correction 1/11/26 10:30pm. I posted a church for the services that appears to be the wrong church. Accordingly, I have deleteed that information; on 1/16/26 @ 3pm, I posted the correct information above.

Interesting Article Featuring DOJ Tax Attorneys (Now Alumni) (1/11/26)

Alumni might be interested in this recent article: Jens Heycke, Tax Enforcers Are Actually the Good Guys (The Dispatch 1/6/26), here. The subtopic is: By cutting resources for prosecuting rich tax cheats, the Trump administration is leaving billions of dollars on the table.

Here is the most relevant excerpt for the Tax Division:

          In 2014, a group of Department of Justice Tax Division attorneys went to a Washington Nationals game, hoping to enjoy a night off watching baseball. But when a camera found them and the ballpark’s Jumbotron flashed “DOJ Tax Division,” the stadium booed them so loudly it rattled the ice cubes in their drinks.

          Few government functions provoke as much reflexive hostility as tax enforcement. This is not lost on the IRS. Its Washington headquarters appears on Google Maps under the obscure label “DC0022 Government Office,” as if anonymity might spare it from the public’s animus. It doesn’t. Nearly 80 percent of the reviews of the building on Constitution Avenue are one star, with comments like: “Horrible organization that needs to be shut down.”

          But here’s what those reviewers and the Nationals crowd missed: The same year those DOJ tax prosecutors got booed, they forced Credit Suisse to pay $2.6 billion for its role in assisting ultra-rich tax evaders. With one settlement, they recovered more than 20 times their annual budget. Meanwhile, the prosecutor who told me about the Nationals Park episode was spearheading another massive investigation. The case, which involved data encrypted into photographs, false-bottom briefcases, and custom-encrypted servers, was settled last month for more than $750 million.

Also, the following except may not be right in that the DOJ Tax Criminal attorneys were transferred to the Criminal Division:

          This year, the Trump administration dismantled the DOJ’s Tax Division, dispersing its attorneys and enforcement functions. The specialists who know how to chase money hidden offshore were relocated to regional U.S. Attorney offices, where they will be assigned to other tasks. Many of the top tax prosecutors have resigned.

Also, I recommend that those with time and interest browse the comments to the article.

Heycke also authored Death, Taxes, and Turduckens: Unraveling History’s Biggest Tax Heist And the Broken System That Enabled It (2025), Amazon here, about the Brockman tax fraud, prosecution, and death avoiding conviction. For Federal Tax Crimes Blog posts on Brockman, see here.

 

Death of Lillie Davis Neamo (1/11/26)

Lillie Davis Neamo passed away 1/1/26. See WAPO obituary here. According to the obituary, she served at DOJ for 42 years and “served as a Supervisory Litigation Assistant for the Tax Division, Appellate Section,” which I presume was her most recent position at DOJ Tax.

According to the obituary, events on 1/14/26 are visitation (10-11am) and service (11am-12pm) at Marshall-March Funeral Homes - The District of Columbia, 5119 4th St. NW, Washington, DC 20011.