May a tax officer widen the scope of an ongoing tax investigation, and what must be shown before that happens?
General information · Not legal advice
Material to check
In a practice file of this kind, we read the papers recording the tax periods and tax types originally covered by the investigation, any later document in which a specific tax evasion suspicion was identified as reaching further periods or other tax types, and the officer's own record of the reason for widening the scope.
These are types of material to look for, not evidence already verified by PRO SE.
Where readings differ
One reading takes the provision as barring a tax officer from widening the scope of an ongoing tax investigation except in the cases the Presidential Decree sets, one of which is where a concrete suspicion of tax evasion is confirmed as relating to several tax periods or to other tax types, so this named example is one route, not the only one.
Another reading reads the words "etc., and other cases as determined by Presidential Decree" as meaning the named confirmed suspicion is itself an example within a wider set of decree-set cases, so a widening may rest on a case the decree sets alone, and this provision names neither that case nor its conditions.
Your judgment
If the officer relies on a decree-set case rather than the confirmed suspicion the provision names, what in the file would show which case the decree sets and that its conditions were met?
PRO SE does not make this decision or keep a case record on this public site.When to reconsider
We look at this again if the provision is amended to define or remove the case left to Presidential Decree, or if a court decision interprets how specifically a tax evasion suspicion must be confirmed before the scope may be widened.