IRS Worker Snooped On Stars

MAY 30--An Internal Revenue Service employee snooped on the tax records of about 200 celebrities and athletes, confessing to investigators that he accessed the confidential material out of 'curiosity.'

John Snyder, a 56-year-old tax examiner from Cincinnati, was named this month in a misdemeanor criminal complaint charging him with accessing the computerized accounts of 'at least 202 taxpayers,' almost all of which were Hollywood figures, sports stars, and 'well-known Cincinnati-area individuals.'

According to the U.S. District Court complaint, a copy of which you'll find here, Snyder used the agency's Integrated Data Retrieval System to examine the accounts of stars like Alec Baldwin, Kevin Bacon, Portia De Rossi, Chevy Chase, Vanna White, Sally Field, Penny Marshall, John Cleese, and the directors Joel and Ethan Coen. According to the complaint, when confronted by federal investigators, 'Snyder confessed to making the...unauthorized accesses, stating that he did so out of curiosity.' (3 pages)