Aretha Franklin estate reaches deal with IRS to pay off claimed $7.8 million tax debt [View all]

When Aretha Franklin died in 2018, a powerful creditor came calling: the Internal Revenue Service.

The IRS claimed the singer’s estate owed more than $7.8 million in unpaid income taxes, interest and penalties, piled up from 2010 to 2017. Even while other thorny dramas in the Queen of Soul’s ongoing probate battle played out, sometimes pitting family against family, the IRS remained the mightiest hammer hanging overhead.

Now, in a major breakthrough, Franklin’s four sons and the IRS have reached an agreement that would speed up payment of the remaining tax burden — while giving the sons an injection of money from their late mother’s fortune.

At the moment, the heirs receive no money from the estate because of the IRS situation.

Read more: https://www.freep.com/story/entertainment/music/brian-mccollum/2021/03/01/aretha-franklin-estate-irs-tax-debt/6864913002/