Tax Documents Found in Atlanta Dumpster

ATLANTA (MyFOX ATLANTA) - Private personal information was found in a dumpster Tuesday. Everything from tax returns to mortgage applications from a midtown accountant's office were found and state investigators said the documents should have been shredded.

John Marshall recycles cardboard from dumpsters, but he said he wasn't expecting what he found in a dumpster along Briarcliff Road.

"I looked in this dumpster and I saw all these file folders it has peoples names, social security numbers, date of births. Too many people have been victimized, it shouldn't happen," said Marshall.

The documents appeared to be tax returns from several different people for a variety of different years. The documents contained personal and financial information of at least 10 people, who were all clients of a midtown CPA office.

We called in the state's office of consumer affairs.
Investigators from the Georgia Office of Consumer Affairs took the documents and searched other dumpsters in the area. Now, investigators are looking into how the files got there.

"The privacy of my clients is the most important thing to me. I am extremely concerned this happened," said CPA Gregg Bossen's, whose name was on all of the documents.

State officials said the documents should have been shredded, and Bossen said he couldn't explain why they weren't.

"This is something I need to talk to my staff about in the morning. I don't know. No, I don't understand how this ended up happening," said Bossen.

All the documents were given over to state Office of Consumer Affairs, but it is still unclear how they ended up in the dumpster.