Inside This Issue

1. Tax Time Guide 2025: Essentials needed for filing a 2024 tax return
2. News from the Justice Department’s Tax Division
3. Technical Guidance

1.  Tax Time Guide 2025: Essentials needed for filing a 2024 tax return

With the 2025 tax filing season underway, the IRS advises taxpayers to make necessary preparations and be informed of important changes that could impact their 2024 tax returns. The Tax Time Guide series officially launches with this announcement. The IRS uses this guide as a source of current information to assist taxpayers and tax professionals in filing accurate returns. A special free help page and a wealth of tools and resources are also available on IRS.gov.

Back to top

2.  News from the Justice Department’s Tax Division

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida issued a permanent injunction against Miami tax return preparer Dieuseul Jean-Louis. The injunction prohibits Jean-Louis from preparing or assisting in the preparation of federal income tax returns, working for or owning any business that prepares taxes, helping others start their own tax preparation businesses, and transferring or assigning customer lists to any other person or entity. The complaint also asserted that Jean-Louis furnished to his clients copies of returns that were different from the returns filed with the IRS, where the return filed with the IRS claimed a higher refund, which allowed Jean-Louis to retain the additional amount for himself without the customers’ knowledge. Additionally, Jean-Louis was ordered by the court to disgorge $245,275 in ill-gotten gains from his return preparation business. Jean-Louis agreed to both the injunction and ordered disgorgement.

The Justice Department filed a civil injunction suit against a group of Georgia tax return preparers seeking to bar them from owning or operating a tax return preparation business and preparing federal tax returns for others. The complaint also requests that the court require the defendants to surrender the fees they received for fraudulently prepared returns. The complaint claims that the defendants prepared thousands of tax returns for 2020 through 2023, and between the beginning of the 2025 filing season and today’s filing, they had already prepared over 400 returns. In addition, the complaint claims that the IRS reviewed income tax returns for 34 of the defendants’ customers and found that returns for 33 of those customers had errors that required an adjustment, often included without the customers’ knowledge or consent. As a result, the complaint alleges that the defendants have cost the United States lost tax revenue as well as the time and resources necessary to investigate the false returns. Furthermore, the complaint claims that the defendants harmed their clients who could potentially face large income tax debts and may be liable for penalties and interest.