Robert L. Beavis, Eugene R. Biscailuz, Alan G. Chesterman, Joan Donohue, on Behalf… v. United States

N OTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
ROBERT L. BEAVIS, EUGENE R. BISCAILUZ,
ALAN G. CHESTERMAN, JOAN DONOHUE, ON
BEHALF OF TODD DONOHUE, ALLEN V.
HARINCK, RANDOLPH K. HINZ, JR., GERALD J.
INNELLA, KENNETH N. OLSON, DAVID E. OTT,
JOSHUA S. RABINOWITZ, JEROME J. SCHUCK,
JAMES W. SCHULTZ, JR.,WILLIAM A. TAYLOR,
GAETAN A. PASSANNANTE, RICHARD KAAPUNI,
GARY W. DAVIS, THOMAS F. SPAYD, WILLIAM J.
ROGALSKI, DIANA RAYMOND,
Plaintiffs-Appellants
v.
UNITED STATES,
Defendant-Appellee
______________________
2023-2222
______________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Federal
Claims in No. 1:09-cv-33307-TMD, Judge Thompson M.
Dietz.
______________________
Decided: October 23, 2025
______________________
Case: 23-2222 Document: 85 Page: 1 Filed: 10/23/2025

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BEAVIS v. US 2
ROBERT L. BEAVIS , Juno Beach, FL, pro se.
EUGENE R. BISCAILUZ, West Hills, CA, pro se.
ALAN G. CHESTERMAN, Orinda, CA, pro se.
J OAN D ONOHUE, Sparta, NJ, pro se.
ALLEN V. HARINCK, Highlands, CO, pro se.
RANDOLPH K. HINZ, J R., Petaluma, CA, pro se.
G ERALD J. I NNELLA, Pittstown, NJ, pro se.
K ENNETH N. O LSON, Dover, NH, pro se.
D AVID E. O TT , Incline Village, NV, pro se.
J OSHUA S. RABINOWITZ, Goodyear, AZ, pro se.
J EROME J. SCHUCK, Carlsbad, CA, pro se.
J AMES W. SCHULTZ, J R., Dover, DE, pro se.
WILLIAM A. T AYLOR, Napa, CA, pro se.
G AETAN A. P ASSANNANTE, Boring, OR, pro se.
RICHARD K AAPUNI , Honolulu, HI, pro se.
G ARY W. D AVIS , Sonoma, CA, pro se.
T HOMAS F. SPAYD, Florence, OR, pro se.
WILLIAM J. ROGALSKI, Meadow Vista, CA, pro se.
D IANA RAYMOND, Scottsdale, AZ, pro se.
Case: 23-2222 Document: 85 Page: 2 Filed: 10/23/2025

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BEAVIS v. US 3
J ANET A. BRADLEY , Tax Division, United States De-
partment of Justice, Washington, DC, for defendant-
appellee. Also represented by BRUCE R. ELLISEN, D AVID
A. HUBBERT .
______________________
Before L OURIE, BRYSON, and CHEN, Circuit Judges.
BRYSON, Circuit Judge.
This tax refund case is a companion to Biestek v.
United States, No. 2023-1467, decided today. The cases
are factually similar in some respects and raise some
similar issues. The most significant difference between
the two cases is that while the plaintiffs in the Biestek
case failed to file timely refund claims or failed to file a
timely complaint in the Court of Federal Claims (“the
Claims Court”), each of the plaintiffs in this case (with
one exception) filed timely refund claims with the Internal
Revenue Service (“IRS”) and filed timely complaints with
the Claims Court.
I
This litigation was initiated by a number of retired
United Airlines pilots who have sought refunds of Federal
Insurance Contribution Act (“FICA”) taxes. The taxes
were paid at the time each of the pilots retired and began
receiving retirement benefits under United’s nonqualified
deferred compensation plan. Pursuant to the special
timing rule of 26 U.S.C. § 3121(v)(2), the tax for each pilot
was paid in a lump sum when each pilot began receiving
benefits under the plan. The amount of the tax paid for
each pilot was based on the calculated present value of
each pilot’s benefits package.
After the pilots retired, United entered bankruptcy.
At the conclusion of the bankruptcy proceedings, the
pilots’ deferred compensation plan was terminated, and
the pilots stopped receiving benefits under the plan.
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BEAVIS v. US 4
Because the plan was terminated, the total amount that
each pilot actually received in benefits under the plan was
less than the value of the expected benefits at the time
each pilot retired. For that reason, the amount each pilot
paid in FICA taxes was greater than each would have
paid if the FICA tax had been paid only on benefits actu-
ally received.
The pilots individually sought refunds of what they
characterized as overpayments of the FICA taxes from the
IRS. When those refund claims were denied, the pilots
sought relief in the Claims Court. The Claims Court
dismissed all of their claims. The plaintiffs, all of whom
are proceeding pro se, have appealed to this court. We
affirm.
II
This litigation began in 2009 when William
Koopmann, one of the retired United pilots, filed a pro se
complaint in the Claims Court seeking a refund of the
FICA taxes that had been withheld by United based on
the value of his expected benefits under the retirement
plan. Mr. Koopmann named more than 160 retired pilots
in addition to himself in the complaint. To manage the
litigation, the Claims Court required each of the pilots to
file individual short form complaints, then severed the
complaints into nine separate groups based on their
common characteristics.
Nineteen of the pilots were grouped together as mem-
bers of what is referred to as the “Beavis group.” The
FICA taxes for those pilots were paid at the time each of
the pilots retired and began receiving retirement benefits
under United’s nonqualified deferred compensation plan.1
1 The appellants object to the use of the term “plan”
to refer to the nonqualified deferred compensation ar-
rangement established by United Airlines, on the ground
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BEAVIS v. US 5
The pilots individually sought refunds of what they char-
acterized as overpayments of the FICA taxes. When those
refund claims were denied, the pilots sought relief in the
Claims Court. The government moved to dismiss all the
plaintiffs’ claims, and the court did so. The court dis-
missed the complaints of all of the plaintiffs except Eu-
gene R. Biscailuz for failure to state a claim upon which
relief can be granted. Beavis v. United States, No. 09-
33307, 2023 WL 4683543 (Fed. Cl. July 20, 2023). The
court dismissed Mr. Biscailuz’s complaint for lack of
jurisdiction on the ground that he failed to file a timely
refund claim with the Secretary of the Treasury. Beavis
v. United States, No. 09-33307, 2023 WL 4675898 (Fed.
Cl. July 20, 2023).
A
The Claims Court based its order dismissing the
complaints of the 18 plaintiffs other than Mr. Biscailuz on
the ground that they were not entitled to refunds of the
FICA taxes that United Airlines had paid on their behalf.
Beavis, 2023 WL 4683543. The court first rejected their
claim that section 3121(v)(2) is unconstitutional because
it authorizes the government to collect taxes on income
before that income is realized. On that issue, the court
ruled that the FICA tax is not an income tax, but an
excise tax, and that there was no constitutional or other
barrier to Congress’s decision, in the circumstances cov-
ered by section 3121(v)(2), to require that the FICA tax be
that because the arrangement was not qualified for pre-
ferred tax status under the Employee Retirement Income
Security Act of 1974, it amounted to simply a debt obliga-
tion of United. Appellants’ Br. 4–6. The use of the term
“plan” is entirely innocuous, however. In the context of
retirement programs, it simply denotes the particular
arrangement that is established to provide retirement
benefits, whatever form that arrangement might take.
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BEAVIS v. US 6
paid in a single lump sum when the beneficiaries of the
plan first begin receiving their benefits. Beavis, 2023 WL
4683543, at *4–5.
The Claims Court also rejected the plaintiffs’ claim
that the government’s failure to return the taxes paid on
income that was never received constituted actionable
unjust enrichment. The court held that the theory of
unjust enrichment was an equitable implied-in-law con-
tract claim that was not within the waiver of sovereign
immunity effected by the Tucker Act. Beavis, 2023 WL
4683543, at *6.
Finally, the Claims Court rejected the plaintiffs’
argument that because the IRS Chief Counsel published
advice on the legal issues surrounding the pilots’ claims
while those claims were pending, their claims were not
independently reviewed by the IRS appeals officers. The
court explained that because it reviews tax refund claims
de novo, any effect of the IRS Chief Counsel’s advice on
the decisions by the IRS appeals officers would be irrele-
vant. Beavis, 2023 WL 4683543, at *6.
B
The Claims Court separately dismissed the complaint
of plaintiff Biscailuz on jurisdictional grounds because,
unlike the other plaintiffs in the Beavis group, Mr. Bis-
cailuz did not file a timely refund claim with the IRS. The
court noted that under sections 7422(a) and 6511(a) of
title 26, a party seeking a tax refund must file an admin-
istrative claim with the IRS either within three years
from the time the return is filed or two years from the
time the tax is paid, whichever period expires later.
Because Mr. Biscailuz retired in 2002, those periods
expired, at the latest, in 2006. It is undisputed that Mr.
Biscailuz did not file his refund claim until 2007. Based
on prior precedents, the court held that a timely filed
administrative claim for a refund was a jurisdictional
requirement, and that Mr. Biscailuz’s failure to file a
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BEAVIS v. US 7
refund claim within the later of the two- or three-year
limitations periods in section 6511(a) required that his
complaint be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. Beavis,
2023 WL 4675898, at *1.
III
A
Mr. Biscailuz has not filed a brief in this case, but
even though he was joined as an appellant in this case, he
asked to join the brief filed by appellant Henderson in the
companion case, Biestek v. United States, No. 23-1467.
Thus, even though Mr. Biscailuz is named in this appeal,
he has elected to associate himself with the appeal in case
No. 23-1467, and this court has allowed him to do so. See
case No. 23-2222, ECF 54. His appeal is therefore gov-
erned by the outcome of the appeal in case No. 23-1467,
and he is bound by the analysis and decision in that case.
For the reasons stated in the Biestek case, we uphold the
dismissal of Mr. Biscailuz’s complaint on jurisdictional
grounds.2
B
We next turn to the claims of the other 18 appellants
in this case. The principal argument raised in their brief
is that section 3121(v)(2) is unconstitutional because it
imposes a tax on a right to income to be received in the
future, rather than income actually received. Appellants’
Br. 7–10.3
2 Diana Raymond, a second plaintiff who was origi-
nally listed as a member of the Beavis group, has also
been associated with the Biestek case for purposes of
appeal.
3 As in the Biestek case, many of the appellants
listed in the caption of Mr. Beavis’s brief did not file
separate notices of appeal; instead, as noted by the gov-
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BEAVIS v. US 8
The appellants’ constitutional challenge to section
3121(v)(2) rests on two propositions, both of which are
wrong. First, they contend that the FICA tax is an in-
come tax, and that the Sixteenth Amendment to the
Constitution prohibits imposing taxes on income that has
not been realized. Second, they contend that the Supreme
Court’s decision in Commissioner v. Glenshaw Glass Co.,
348 U.S. 426, 431 (1955), defines “income” for all taxation
purposes to mean “instances of undeniable accessions to
wealth, clearly realized, and over which the taxpayers
have complete dominion.” Appellants’ Br. 7.
To begin with, it is well established that the FICA tax
on wages is not an income tax, but an excise tax. See
United States v. Fior D’Italia, Inc., 536 U.S. 238, 240
(2002); United States v. Cleveland Indians Baseball Co.,
532 U.S. 200, 204 (2001); Xianli Zhang v. United States,
640 F.3d 1358, 1366–67 (Fed. Cir. 2011). Any constitu-
tional limitations imposed by the Sixteenth Amendment
are inapplicable to excise taxes, as the Sixteenth Amend-
ment applies only to income taxes, not to excise taxes,
which are separately authorized in Article I, Section 8,
Clause 1 of the Constitution.
The definition of “income” in 26 U.S.C. § 22(a) (1939)
(now 26 U.S.C. § 61(a)), which was at issue in the Glen-
shaw Glass case, is confined to income for purposes of the
ernment (Appellee’s Br. 12), timely notices of intention to
appeal were filed only by appellants Beavis and Biscailuz.
Because Mr. Beavis was proceeding pro se, he was not
authorized to represent others, see Baude v. United
States, 955 F.3d 1290, 1305–06 (Fed. Cir. 2020), so his
notice of appeal did not grant party status to any of the
other would-be appellants. As in Biestek, however, the
failure of most of the would-be appellants to perfect their
appeals does not prevent this court from addressing all
the issues raised in the brief filed on their behalf.
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BEAVIS v. US 9
imposition of income taxes. See Glenshaw Glass, 348 U.S.
at 429–30. Nothing in Glenshaw Glass suggests that
Congress is prohibited from modifying the definition of
income or wages in particular ways, especially with
respect to taxes other than income taxes. That is what
Congress did in section 3121(v)(2), where it allowed an
excise tax to be imposed on deferred wages promised to
the recipient, but not yet received. There is no constitu-
tional authority suggesting that defining wages in that
fashion, for the specific purpose set forth in section
3121(v)(2), is beyond Congress’s authority.
C
The appellants make several other arguments that
can be disposed of summarily. First, they argue that the
statute establishing the FICA tax designates it as being
“collected by the employer of the taxpayer, by deducting
the amount of the tax from the wages as and when paid.”
Appellants’ Br. 8 (quoting 26 U.S.C. § 3102). Because the
tax in this case was not collected “as and when [the em-
ployees’ wages were] paid,” the appellants contend that it
could not lawfully be collected in the manner that it was,
that is, before the wages were paid. The short answer to
that contention is that the special timing rule of 26 U.S.C.
§ 3121(v)(2) creates a statutory exception to the general
rule of 26 U.S.C. § 3102, something that Congress is
entitled to do and clearly did.
Moreover, section 3121(a) of the Internal Revenue
Code defines “wages” to mean “all remuneration for
employment, including the cash value of all remuneration
(including benefits) paid in any medium other than cash”
with certain exceptions. 26 U.S.C. § 3121(a). Retirement
benefits undoubtedly qualify under that definition as
“wages.” The only question is whether those benefits can
lawfully be defined to include the present value of prom-
ised wages to be paid in the future. Such a promised
benefit clearly has present value, and we discern no
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BEAVIS v. US 10
constitutional or other impediment to Congress’s decision
to tax the value of that benefit before the funds are actu-
ally paid.
The appellants next contend (Appellants’ Br. 9–10)
that some of the retired United pilots were granted re-
funds. The government responds that if any such refunds
were granted based on the arguments the appellants are
making, those refunds were granted in error. Appellee’s
Br. 24. In any event, the fact that the government may
have granted some refunds does not mean that it forfeited
its right to enforce the governing statutes against other
claimants. See Dickman v. Comm’r, 465 U.S. 330, 343
(1984).
Finally, the appellants argue that the IRS was re-
quired by the Administrative Procedure Act to “exhaust
its administrative remedies within the Agency before it
can sue to recover any other taxes on income received
afterward, and the Circuit lacks jurisdiction to award
[refunds] until administrative remedies are exhausted
and a lawsuit comes before them.” Appellants’ Br. 12.
Any requirement to exhaust administrative remedies
applies to parties seeking relief from a government agen-
cy, not the other way around. And this case does not
involve an action brought by the government; the action
for a refund was brought by the appellants. The govern-
ment was not subject to any exhaustion requirement in
this case, under the Administrative Procedure Act or
otherwise.
No costs.
AFFIRMED
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