X-Message-Number: 9863 Date: Sat, 6 Jun 1998 14:02:03 -0400 (EDT) From: Charles Platt <> Subject: Trusts Robert Ettinger expresses curiosity about CryoCare's history of negotiations for tax-exempt status. There's no secret about this; it was reported a couple of years ago in CryoCare Report, and the text is readily available on our web site at www.cryocare.org. CryoCare was advised by attorneys at Ernst and Young that since we are in a "fee for service" business (i.e. offering the service of freezing people in exchange for specific, standardized fees) it would be unwise for us to seek tax-exempt status under section 501(c)3 of the federal tax code. Opinions on this subject vary, but we chose to take the advice and applied, instead, for tax-exempt status as a cemetery association under section 501(c)13. After various hearings (conducted by IRS officials, not in court) the application was denied on the grounds that our purpose is to reanimate our patients and restore them to life; whereas a cemetery association's purpose is to store human remains after (permanent) death. In other words, the IRS disallowed the application on the grounds that cryonics might work! Courtney Smith spent a considerable amount of time and money pursuing this issue. We have not given up on it, but there is no further progress to report at this time. Currently, CryoCare remains nonprofit but not tax-exempt. Regarding individual trusts, CryoCare's publicly stated position has always been that the money that belongs to you while you're alive should still belong to you (in whatever way is legally feasible) after legal death, and should be applied exclusively to your own reanimation, unless the reanimation turns out to be impossible, in which case the money may be used in other ways predetermined by its original owner. CI (and, I believe, Alcor) prefers to pool all the money formerly owned by individual patients. This of course is done with the full prior knowledge and understanding of people who sign up for cryopreservation on this basis. --Charles Platt CryoCare Foundation Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=9863