Opinion of the Court
of Trust and Estate Counsel as Amicus Curiae 5–7.[1]
The Secretary’s regulations implementing the BSA convey the same message. Under those regulations, individuals with fewer than 25 accounts must provide details about each account while those (like Mr. Bittner) with 25 or more accounts do not need to list each one or provide account-specific details about any of them. 31 CFR §1010.350(g)(1). Instead, filers with 25 or more accounts “need only provide the number of financial accounts and certain other basic information.” Ibid. Naturally, an individual must supply more “detailed information” if the “Secretary or his delegate” later chooses to follow up and request it. Ibid. But no detailed account-level information is required in the filer’s initial report. It’s yet another feature of the BSA and its regulatory scheme that suggests the law aims to provide the government with a report sufficient to tip it to the need for further investigation, not to ensure the presentation of every detail or maximize revenue for each mistake.
The Secretary’s regulation also points to some of the anomalies that accompany the government’s per-account theory. On the government’s telling, an individual with, say, three accounts who makes nonwillful errors when providing details about these accounts faces a potential penalty of $30,000. He faces that penalty no matter how slight his errors, and regardless whether his foreign holdings (or even net worth) approach the same amount. Meanwhile, a person with 300 bank accounts runs far less risk of
- ↑ The dissent insists that its per-account theory would better advance “the statute’s purpose” of cracking down on criminals and terrorists. Post, at 9. But few statutes pursue their stated “ ‘purpose at all costs.’ ” Kucana v. Holder, 558 U. S. 233, 252 (2010). Nor is it clear how calculating nonwillful penalties on a per-account basis would advance the purpose the dissent attributes to the BSA. Are we to imagine that drug cartels and terrorists often make innocent mistakes when filing their FBARs?
