Girls Gone Wild boss Joe Francis faces huge IRS debt
Posted on November 19th, 2009 by Austin
(HMG) – Since debuting his first ‘Girls Gone Wild’ epic in 1998, internet porn guru Joe Francis has been in the IRS’ cross-hairs for alleged tax evasion, and they finally bagged him this year.
With annual sales above $40-million and no shareholders to pay, Joe’s making big bucks. And now Uncle Sam wants his share. The boys at the service claim he owes 3-years of back-taxes and have now issued a lien against Joe and his Santa Monica-based firm for no less than $33,819,087.14.
…And Joe won’t pay up.
In 2001, the IRS claims Joe…’forgot’ to pay $17.6-million. In 2002, the debt was $11.25-million, and in 2003 they say the 36-year old entrepreneur skipped a payment of $4.9-million.
Joe, as you’ve guessed, doesn’t see it that way.
“I have no idea what this is,” he told TMZ, “This is total retaliation for me beating them in court.” He also claims the law the IRS are employing to drain all his cash hasn’t been used against anyone else since the mid-70’s.
It should be mentioned that at a hearing in July of last year, Joe’s attorney proved the tax returns for the businesses were handled by a former corporate accountant and never even seen by Joe or his staff. When these returns began to cause problems the accountant not only quit, but then tried to collect a fat check from the Feds for testifying against Joe for the debt they had caused.
But despite such clear proof of fraud, the feds also seized more than $100-million for Joe’s alleged misdeeds.
Joe’s current solution to the gathering storm is to file for personal bankruptcy, which he told the reporters will be done sometime today. What happens next could be a film by itself…
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