Memo to Directors & Officers: Make Sure Your Company Pays Its Franchise Taxes!
November 29, 2012In this Memorandum Opinion, the appellant, a director of a bankrupt company, was found liable for the amount the bankruptcy court required his company to distribute to a creditor. Strangely, this personal liability was based on Chapter 171 of the Tax Code, which provides that if a corporation forfeits its “corporate privileges” for failure to pay its franchise taxes, each director or officer of the corporation is liable for any debt of the corporation. While the appellant argued that this provision only applied to tax liabilities, the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s decision and held that “[n]othing in the wording of this statute suggests that personal liability of officers and directors is limited to the tax liability.”
