Enron whistleblower gets $1.1 million from IRS

[babsbunny]

http://money.msn.com/tax-tips/post.aspx?post=d776e6a3-2464-43a1-8a97-250b9a875b6a

Anonymous tipster alerted the feds to $600 million tax-evasion scheme. Yes, the bounty is taxable.
By Kay Bell on Fri, Mar 18, 2011 4:41 PM

A whistleblower who exposed a tax fraud scheme by Enron and Wall Street firms has been awarded a $1.1 million reward by the Internal Revenue Service.



The payout came from the new IRS Whistleblower Office, but was made under prior, less generous guidelines. Those older rules, which still apply in some instances, call for a reward of up to 15% of the money that the IRS recovers based on the information.



The whistleblower office was revamped in 2006. Now when whistleblower information about alleged tax cheating leads to IRS collection of unpaid taxes and the subsequent recovery amount exceeds $2 million, the whistleblower can pocket up to 30% of the recovered money.



Article continues below