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Tax Court Virtual Trial Session Succeeds With Brief Tech Hiccups

Posted on Sep. 18, 2020

Detroit’s first virtual Tax Court trial session unfolded fairly seamlessly this week, with one trial taking place despite brief technical obstacles, according to Tax Court Judge Ronald L. Buch.

Buch presided over Detroit’s trial session, which kicked off via calendar call September 14 along with sessions in San Francisco and Los Angeles. “The Detroit session is concluded. It’s a wrap,” he said.

During a September 17 virtual Tax Court luncheon, Buch said that a minor problem arose during parts of the virtual session, including during the trial, in connecting the court’s audio to its public YouTube feed. The problem took less than a minute to fix and wasn’t noticeable during the roughly two-hour trial, he explained, adding that the hiccup might have been a bandwidth issue.

The session started off with 73 cases, and some practical methods were changed in transitioning to a remote-hearing setting, such as permitting the submission of pretrial memos and similar documents three weeks ahead of the calendar call instead of two weeks, said Buch.

After canceling its spring trial sessions, the Tax Court announced May 29 that court proceedings would be held remotely because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and it also loosened restrictions to allow limited entries of appearance to be filed as soon as a trial session has been announced — instead of after a trial session has started, which was the rule beforehand.

Of the 73 cases, most were resolved with the parties agreeing to a decision, and 13 cases were continued generally, said Buch, adding that nine collection cases were voluntarily dismissed by their parties. “We basically enter a decision in those, and that permits the commissioner to proceed with collection activity,” he explained.

Buch said that as a former private attorney, he had been a part of some trials with electronic exhibits in the past but not a fully virtual trial. Describing some uses of technology, he said that he’d shared his screen with relevant parties during the trial to display submitted exhibits in PDF format on his computer.

Smartphones should work for connecting to proceedings on the Zoom for Government videoconferencing platform, Buch said, adding that credibility issues can arise with telephonic hearings, such as when dealing with fraud cases.

Buch expressed optimism about the court using both remote and in-person hearings after the pandemic, saying that “there is room for some blend of having the flexibility” to do both.

“I have not seen a case yet that would be incapable of being done remotely, but that case may exist,” said Buch.

In some cases, remote proceedings could benefit taxpayers with geographical constraints, Buch said, giving the example of someone living in Alpena, Michigan, and having to travel several hours to Detroit for a Tax Court hearing. The Tax Court typically holds its trial sessions in 74 cities across the United States. 

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