My wife and I learned this tax season that someone had filed a fraudulent tax return using our identity. We always seem to pay more, so, we take our time with filing a return. We had to take off from work and contact the IRS and the Delaware Department of Revenue. Thank God, the IRS did not send a refund, thinking this return was a scam. Upon going to our state tax office, we learned that the State of Delaware did send out a refund of over $5,000, and it was direct-deposited into an account. The money was then transferred to India. My true concern is that technology has now overcome the use of common sense. I know that using computers can make filing so much faster; however, there need to be simple checks put in place from the last return filed. Just checking my return from last year would have shown that a retired police officer normally doesn’t become a doctor and an office manager normally does not become a college professor. (Alert) human eyes need to look at this return. We did not have most of these problems when they just mailed you a refund check. You got to see it and put it in your hands and feel that you deserved it. I hope that our political leaders take note of this and ask the following question: How much did the State of Delaware pay out in false tax filings? How much have we been able to recover? How do we stop this from happening? If you’re planning on bailing out our gambling houses by building more, you’re not going to get more money from me if you’re going to send it overseas.

Bruce E. Timmons Clayton