Can the CRA use evidence it has obtained (arguably) illegally using its civil audit powers in the course of a criminal investigation in reassessing a taxpayer for civil purposes? I would have thought that the answer was ‘yes’, and the Court in Piersanti v R, 2013 TCC 226, seemed to think the same thing. Bill Innes, however, seems to think that, if the taxpayer had successfully challenged the introduction of the evidence at her criminal trial, the Tax Court judge would have also excluded it for the purposes of the appeal of the civil assessments.
