Recently, the matter of insanity among judges came up through Sol Wachtler, former chief judge of the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, and Diane Kroupa, who sat on the United States Tax Court.  Each of these now ex-judges beclouded their respective benches.  Wachtler, who had claimed mental illness, copped a plea bargain, sparing the New York State Unified Court System a tidal wave of questions regarding the validity of his rulings. I have speculated about Kroupa's objectivity in deciding tax cases while under examination by the IRS and while expecting indictment on criminal tax charges, a tax community sentiment in which I do not stand alone. Quite unsurprisingly, per a plea agreement, Kroupa pleaded guilty before U.S. district judge Wilhelmina Wright on 21 October to one of the six tax crimes hanging over her.  (Robert Fackler, Kroupa's husband and co-defendant, had already pleaded guilty in the matter.) As a tax professional, I found a...(Read Full Post)