The NY State Department of Taxation and Finance is pretty sneaky. After years of observing the Yankee captain's comments, lawyers are saying that DJ owes hundreds of thousands in back taxes.
Though Jeter's Yankees salary is partially taxed by NY State, he has claimed that his primary residence is in Florida, which has no state tax. The argument from tax officials is that Jeter has made statements "professing his love for New York" and that ""He keeps items near and dear in his New York apartment...He became immersed in the New York community."
Jeter has a $13 million apartment at the Trump World Plaza, near the U.N., and is also in the middle of a 10-year, $189 million contract with the Yankees (and makes significant income from endorsements). The co-chair of Multistate Tax Issues for the New York State Bar Association Tax Section Executive Committee Robert Brown told the Post, "My suspicion is if you have a person who's a multimillion-dollar entertainer, and all of a sudden you see that the most expensive house he has is a house in New York, you might reasonably ask about his [residency]." And a neighbor at the Trump World Plaza says he "definitely lives here. We see him coming and going all the time. He has half a floor with 16-foot ceilings."
Jeter's lawyers claimed that the state's evidence was weak, and a judge has asked the state for more specific evidence, which is due Sunday. We bet Jeter's lawyers will present Jeter's travel itinerary and the tabloids as evidence he's not a NY State resident - half the time when we read about him in the gossip columns, he's off in the Caribbean with some starlet!
