Dealer's Bill Taxes French Fiscal Limits
French authorities have presented a convicted heroin dealer with an 80,000-euro tax bill on his earnings ... after allowing for his personal consumption and travel expenses.
The dealer, currently in prison in Nancy in eastern France, recently received a demand for payment based on his supposed 2008-11 earnings, his lawyer Samira Boudiba told Agence France Presse.
"He is being treated as if he was a small businessman -- it is quite extraordinary," Boudiba said.
"How can you tax an activity that is completely illegal?" she said, adding that she was seeking a review of the demand by France's Constitutional Council.
The tax demand received by the prisoner includes a remarkably detailed evaluation of the dealer's likely income and "allowable" expenses, according to the lawyer.
It notes: "Your personal consumption has been evaluated at four grams per day, which can be deducted from your sales."
It goes on to state that since the dealer's main supplier was based in Namur in Belgium, a total of 2,000 euros a year in travel expenses could be classified as a deductible expense.
The dealer's lawyers are challenging the demand on several grounds, including the fact that the fiscal year 2008 should not be included in the demand under the current rules governing the proscription of retrospective tax demands.
"Also, my client has already had 40,000 euros in cash confiscated as well as all his other assets which the state is going to resell," said the lawyer.
"Yet they are trying to tax the money used to pay for these assets -- it's a double punishment!"
Source: Agence France Presse
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