ILL-inois: IRS says judge owes $227K, he makes $190K a year

I think it's time that patriots converge on government buildings wCourtesy of the Chicago Sun-Times, here's another Illinois embarrassment.

Cook County Circuit Judge Tommy Brewer is being hounded by the Internal Revenue Service.

The IRS has slapped Brewer with seven liens — two filed as recently as last year — seeking payment of a total of $227,559 in personal income taxes while Brewer was an attorney in private practice between 1997 and 2010, the year the Illinois Supreme Court appointed him to a vacant seat on the Cook County bench.

"I'm a good guy," the judge says. "I'm not trying to cheat anybody out of anything. I'm trying to battle them as I can. I'm not saying I don’t owe them anything. I thought I owed them about $50,000 . . . I pay my tax religiously.

"They're just claiming that I didn’t file," says Brewer, who's among thousands of Cook County residents and businesses the state or federal government have gone after since 1985 for unpaid taxes, court fines or restitution in criminal cases. "In the later years, they say I didn’t pay enough. So I went out and hired an accountant. He suggested I start paying them. I have an installment agreement with them. I'm paying them a pretty penny."