Liberal Construction and Severe Sentencing Help RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Achieve Its Legislative Goals

• NCJ Number: 88238
• Journal: Loyola University Law Journal Volume: 13 Issue: 4 Dated: (Summer 1982) Pages: 1083-1111
• Author(s): R K Peterson
• Date Published: 1982
• Length: 29 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: *This document is currently unavailable from NCJRS.

Annotation

An analysis of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) of 1970 focuses on the law's provision requiring defendants to forfeit any capital acquired or maintained in violation of the act.

Abstract

Debate has focused on the proper scope of the law. Some believe that the law applies only to organized crime in legitimate business, while others believe that RICO should be used to prosecute racketeers in either legitimate or illegitimate businesses. In United States v. Turkette in 1981, the Supreme Court held that RICO applied to racketeering in both legitimate and wholly illegitimate enterprises. This liberal construction supports the congressional plan to use the law to vigorously prosecute and convict organized criminals to mete out the law's enhanced and innovative sanctions. The two issues which have arisen regarding the use of forfeiture are whether the issuance of a forfeiture order is mandatory or discretionary and whether the forfeiture extends to the profits of an illegal enterprise or is limited to an interest or investment in the enterprise. To achieve the goal of the forfeiture provision, a convicted defendant should always have to forfeit some part of the forfeitable holdings. Courts should modify the forfeiture order only when the presumption that the forfeiture is proportionate to the crime is rebutted. In the Marubeni decision, the Ninth Circuit limited forfeitures to interests in an enterprise and thereby placed such activities as arson and prostitution beyond the reach of the forfeiture provision. Other court decisions have held that consecutive sentences under the RICO statute are permissible and do not violate the double jeopardy clause of the Constitution. As long as the government carefully chooses its RICO prosecutions, the courts will adhere to the liberal construction provided in Turkette. Otherwise, the courts might limit application of the RICO provision, and an essential component in the government's efforts against organized crime would be lost. Footnotes are provided. (Author summary modified)