John C. Klotsche is a member in Caplin & Drysdale’s Washington, DC office. He joined the firm in June 2008 and practices in the Tax Controversy group. He is spearheading the launch of the firm’s new practice area that specializes in
Alternative
Dispute
Resolution of tax matters. It is known as ADRTax.
Mr. Klotsche practiced for close to three decades with an international law firm specializing in international tax matters. A significant part of his practice involved handling complex federal income tax controversies for publicly held corporate clients at the IRS Audit and Appeals levels, before the United States Tax Court, various federal district courts, the United States Court of Federal Claims, and various federal courts of appeals. He has been counsel in landmark cases involving cross-border transfer pricing and other international tax issues.
He concluded his career with the international law firm serving five years as full-time Chairman of its Executive Committee.
He then served an appointment for 3½ years as Senior Advisor to the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. There he oversaw the Agency’s enforcement efforts to combat abusive tax shelters that involved developing: (a) global settlement initiatives to resolve widespread, large-tax dollar abusive transactions, (b) legislative solutions for submission to the Congressional tax writing Committees, (c) protocols to allow simultaneous criminal and civil investigations and examinations of tax shelter matters, and (d) civil and criminal enforcement tools to combat unethical and unprofessional activities of promoters of abusive tax shelters and their tax professionals.
Most recently and immediately prior to joining Caplin & Drysdale, he served an appointment for one year as Senior International Advisor to the IRS Commissioner where he was the U.S. delegate and a member of the project team on the OECD Tax Intermediaries Project. This initiative examined the role of tax intermediaries (i.e., law and accounting firms, other tax advisers and financial institutions) and their impact on tax administration and enforcement. The Project’s overarching objective was to identify strategies for enhancing the relationships between tax intermediaries, corporate taxpayers and revenue bodies and the team’s recommendations were unanimously endorsed by the Commissioners of 43 participating countries in January 2008.
Mr. Klotsche’s practice with the firm will focus on ADRTax. Caplin & Drysdale is the first U.S. law firm to establish a specialized tax practice group dedicated solely to providing legal services to help resolve tax disputes through ADR techniques such as non-binding mediation or binding arbitration. The ADRTax practice group consists of practitioners with both private and public sector tax controversy experience as well as practitioners experienced in commercial mediation and arbitration.