Poyner v. Commissioner

Poyner v. Commissioner
Court	United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
Full case name	Ernest L. Poyner, et al v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue
Argued	November 21, 1961
Decided	March 21, 1962
Citations	301 F.2d 287 (4th Cir. 1962) 62-1 USTC (CCH) ¶ 9387
Court membership
Judges sitting	Simon Sobeloff, Morris Ames Soper, J. Spencer Bell
Case opinions
Majority	Sobeloff, joined by Soper, Bell
Laws applied
Internal Revenue Code
Keywords
Gift

Poyner v. Commissioner 301 F.2d 287 (4th Cir.1962) is a United States tax law case that discusses whether "special death benefits" paid to an employee's widow are exempt from taxes as a gift under §102(a).

It produces five factors as a pertinent test:

(1) whether the payments were made to the spouse of the deceased shareholder, not to his estate;

(2) whether the payor had been under no obligation to make the payments and had, in fact, decided on previous occasions not to make payments to persons qualified;

(3) whether the company derived benefit of an economic nature from the payments;

(4) whether the recipient had ever performed any services for the company;

(5) whether the services of the deceased employee had been fully compensated during his lifetime.

Citations

• Commissioner v. Duberstein, 363 U.S. 278 (1960)
• United States v. Kaiser, 363 U.S. 299 (1960)
• Bogardus v. Commissioner, 302 U.S. 34 (1937)
• Simpson v. United States, 261 F.2d 497 (7th Cir. 1958)
• Bounds v. United States, 262 F.2d 876 (4th Cir. 1958)

External links

• Text of Poyner v. Commissioner, 301 F.2d 287 (4th Cir.1962) is available from: CourtListener Justia OpenJurist Google Scholar