{"id":551345,"date":"2026-03-28T23:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T23:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/551345\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T23:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T23:56:12","slug":"first-survivor-winner-richard-hatch-owes-3-3m-on-winnings-judge-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/551345\/","title":{"rendered":"First \u2018Survivor\u2019 winner Richard Hatch owes $3.3M on winnings, judge says"},"content":{"rendered":"

Richard Hatch, the winner of the first season of \u201cSurvivor,\u201d<\/a> must pay taxes on his winnings<\/a> that he\u2019s been disputing since the show\u2019s conclusion in 2000.<\/p>\n

But, his sister won\u2019t have to give up two houses in the process.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0Rhode Island<\/a>\u00a0judge issued the final judgment that Hatch must pay taxes on the $1 million he won on the show. With taxes and interest, that tax debt has ballooned to $3.3 million as Hatch has continued to challenge the tax debt in court.<\/p>\n

Judge\u00a0John J. McConnell Jr. paved the way for the IRS to collect. But the decision came after another judge said the IRS could not try to collect the money by levying two houses under the name of Hatch\u2019s sister. The government argued he had actually transferred those to her and so they should be fair game.<\/p>\n

In a statement to Realtor.com\u00ae, Hatch said he is appealing to the Boston-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u00a0am confident that the appellate court\u2019s review of the full record, including evidence that was not adequately addressed below, will result in a just outcome,\u201d Hatch said. \u201cI have spent 25 years trying to do the right thing in a complicated situation, and I remain committed to resolving this matter fairly.\u201d<\/p>\n

How long has Hatch been battling the IRS?<\/p>\n

Hatch\u2019s longstanding dispute with the IRS began shortly after the series\u2019 first season wrapped in 2000.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0Rhode Island\u00a0judge issued the final judgment that Hatch must pay taxes on the $1 million he won on the show. CBS via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Court records show the IRS accused Hatch of\u00a0not paying tax on<\/a>\u00a0the $1 million in prize money he received, in addition to a car he won on the show. He also did not report taxes on some other work, including compensation for co-hosting a radio show, the IRS said.<\/p>\n

Hatch was indicted on felony tax evasion charges and fraud, but a jury found him guilty only of filing false personal income tax returns in 2006.<\/p>\n

Hatch\u2019s longstanding dispute with the IRS began shortly after the series\u2019 first season wrapped in 2000. Getty Images<\/p>\n

In legal filings, he told the court he believed the taxes on the winnings should be paid by either CBS or the show\u2019s production company. But years of litigation in the district court has resulted in several rulings against him.<\/p>\n

The government renewed its attempt to collect the tax in 2022, and tried to place tax liens on two Newport, RI, properties under the name of Hatch\u2019s sister. It argued that he\u2019d transferred them to her and thus it should be able to levy the two houses to pay down his tax debt.<\/p>\n

But a different judge denied that request because the government didn\u2019t prove Hatch had any remaining interest in the houses. And his sister prevailed on an argument that the 2003 and 2005 property transfers were time-barred.<\/p>\n

Hatch was indicted on felony tax evasion charges and fraud, but a jury found him guilty only of filing false personal income tax returns in 2006. FilmMagic<\/p>\n

McConnell\u00a0said this month<\/a>\u00a0that Hatch couldn\u2019t challenge the government\u2019s refusal to renew his passport in court, because the IRS labeled him a \u201cseriously delinquent taxpayer.\u201d<\/p>\n

And in a final order dated March 18, McConnell said there were no outstanding issues to litigate from the government\u2019s effort to reduce the tax assessments to judgment.<\/p>\n

CBS is airing \u201cSurvivor 50<\/a>,\u201d which features several winners<\/a> from previous years, though Hatch isn\u2019t a contestant.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Richard Hatch, the winner of the first season of \u201cSurvivor,\u201d must pay taxes on his winnings that he\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":551346,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[236,6870,91,88,77635,38340,2066,2355,1548],"class_list":["post-551345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-celebrity-finances","tag-celebrity-news","tag-entertainment","tag-irs","tag-judges","tag-money","tag-survivor","tag-taxes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=551345"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551345\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/551346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}