Kristen Cheser – Staff Writer
Established in 2002 the Adrian Project offers students a hands-on experience with IRS criminal investigation. As a part of the Adrian Project, a day-long interactive experience, UW students had a chance to look into the world of being an IRS agent. In the program, IRS criminal investigators educate students on what it is like to be in their field of work.
“For future accounting students this is something you should take part of if their [the future accounting students are] interested in being an IRS agent or just to experience something new,” Preston Mackey, an accounting major said.
“I learned there’s a lot [of work] to be an IRS agent. There’s a lot of paperwork, a lot of steps to even get to your main points. [The IRS agents] said in some cases [it can] take over a year.”
Students who were a part of the mock investigation were given scenarios based on true IRS cases and got to act out the investigation for one day on Oct. 11. Twenty-five students participated this year and learned about how to discover the crime, analyze the evidence, and how to apprehend the criminals.
“Anyone interested in maybe working for the IRS, so any accounting or finance majors, even business majors might find it interesting.” said Kimmie Takaki, a graduate accounting student. She also said there are other fields who could look into the IRS as a career.
“We got wired up so if you’re in IT this might be something you’re interested in.”
Mackey and Takaki described the scenario they were given. Local Law enforcement called in with a vehicle full of treasury checks. The students then searched the car for any evidence. After, they interviewed the owner of the car until they had a lead on a new suspect. They performed a stake out and then went to a judge to ask permission to arrest the man. Finally, they went to the man’s house and took him into custody.
“The IRS is not as boring as people think,” Takaki said. “There’s the IRS where you pay the taxes and there’s the other component that we got to experience.”
“My favorite part was banging on the door and arresting the guy and handcuffing him,” Mackey said.
Dr. Mac Festa, an assistant professor at the college of business, helped orchestrate the event. He said the event has been taking place at UW for three years now. He also said the IRS agents who come in to run the simulated white-collar crimes are essentially FBI agents focused on tax fraud and evasions.
