Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, provided an update this week on his correspondence with several media-based ministries about issues related to their tax-exempt status, indicating that some ministries have not been answering his questions.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit issued an opinion in a tax dispute that found the U.S. Tax Court is not a court as defined by law.

A jury returned guilty verdicts against Joseph H. Smith, the former treasurer, CFO and legal secretary of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, on charges of conspiracy and filing false tax returns.

CCH began offering Global Daily Tax News on its CCH Tax Research Network, providing country-specific national and local tax and business news coverage to help users remain in compliance and support their tax planning.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held hearings on proposed tax treaties and protocols with Canada, Iceland and Bulgaria.

National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson has released a report outlining her office’s priorities over the coming fiscal year, including improving Internal Revenue Service procedures to protect victims of tax-related identity theft and helping people who have lost their homes to foreclosure.

The Internal Revenue Service has issued a new revenue procedure that aims to clear up some of the murkiness surrounding subprime loans and the tax treatment of securitized versions of those loans, though the murkiness is likely to remain for the majority of those loans anyway.