Interesting Income Tax Exemption!

Income tax time is not usually considered a fun time for most of us. It is often a boring, repetitive and uninteresting exercise. That changed this year, however, when I stumbled upon the following information package

Topic 357 - Tax Information for Parents of Kidnapped Children

You may claim a kidnapped child as your dependent if the following requirements are met:

1. The child must be presumed by law enforcement to have been kidnapped by someone who is not a member of your family or a member of the child's family, and
2. The child had, for the taxable year in which the kidnapping occurred, the same principal place of abode as the taxpayer for more than one-half of the portion of such year before the date of kidnapping.

If both of these requirements are met, the child may meet the requirements for purposes of determining:

* The dependency exemption
* The child tax credit, and
* Head of household or qualifying widow(er) with dependent child filing status.

This tax treatment will cease to apply as of your first tax year beginning after the calendar year in which either there is a determination that the child is dead or the child would have reached age 18, whichever occurs first.

For more information, refer to Publication 501, Exemptions, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information.

Of course I did a double take when I read it. I thought for sure that someone was scamming me and had made up the entire article.

I did a triple take when I searched the US Internal Revenue site and found that, in fact, the above is a completely legitimate exemption. You can claim any of your kidnapped children as an income tax exemption!

Had I known this thirty years ago, my two sons would certainly have some interesting stories to tell today!