hoshi51

Richard Hatch won $1,000,000 on the first season of Survivor. The IRS says he now owes $3.3 million on it. 51 million people watched him win in August 2000. He never paid the tax on the prize. His defense: he says he caught producers sneaking food to other players, and the show promised to cover his taxes if he won. CBS never commented. The appeals court said he never showed any proof of a deal. In 2006 a jury convicted him. He served 51 months in federal prison. In 2011 he went back for nine more, for not fixing his returns. Then the bill kept growing. This March, 26 years after the finale, a federal judge let the IRS collect about $3.3 million with interest. The government put liens on two of his homes in Newport. He is appealing on his own, without a lawyer. In the video below he explains why he thinks the tax was never his to pay. "The taxes on the million were required by law… to have been paid to Malaysia before we left the island… by CBS or Mark Burnett." The case for Hatch: if the show made that promise, he was set up. The case for the IRS: a $1 million check is income. Everyone else pays theirs. Was the first Survivor winner played by the show, or did he try to outwit the wrong player?