RICO

In the history of legal theory, the criminal enterprise has evolved ahead of the resources of the state or competent authority to interdict their activities. Violence and an assortment of behaviors have been associated with the high payoffs of such enterprises. The incapacitation of such illegal acts has also incurred within the state or government itself. The following are a highlight of topics from the United States Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Statute or RICO and the Continuing Criminal Enterprise Statute or CCE.

I hope the two following short papers on these topics will aid those who share an interest in this subject.

David Nollmeyer

The RICO Statutes or more correctly the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act are fast becoming a major source of legal code for both criminal and civil actions. More formally RICO is TITLE 18, PART 1, CHAPTER 96, Section 1961 of the United States Code. Other prominent sections of the law are as follows:

·         Sec. 1961  Definitions

·         Sec. 1962  Prohibited activities

·         Sec. 1963  Criminal penalties

·         Sec. 1964  Civil remedies

·         Sec. 1965  Venue and process

·         Sec. 1966  Expedition of actions

·         Sec. 1967  Evidence

·         Sec. 1968  Civil investigative demand

The history of RICO has origins in prohibitions into piracy, smuggling, and forfeiture. Following the Norman Conquest of England, William the Conqueror (1066-1087) instituted a land tenure system based on the principle of absolute ownership by the Crown.  In essence this was feudalism. The introduction of the concept of felony in British common law is genus for the species treason. The term felonia first appears in 1108 during the reign of Henry I (1100-1135) and is used to discuss a vassal's breach of contract to his lord (Goebel, 1976). Feudalism was not abolished in England until 1660.

Treason resulted in death as well as an immediate forfeiture of lands and property to the king. Felonies resulted in death and land and chattel were escheated to the lord (Greek, 2003). Hence the modern code has been particularized from English common law and other codes designed to fight organized crime from the thirties. There is also a nexus with other foreign laws as the countries of Italy and Russia to fight Mafia styled crime and racketeering.

The sophisticated nature and scope of systematic crime gave rise to a more unified crime fighting tool (Cain, 1996):

However, in 1970, in order to meet the rise in organized crime activity, Congress enacted RICO, the first criminal forfeiture statute in American history. RICO allows the seizure of property, particularly money, obtained from a "pattern of racketeering activity." It is an effective weapon on the war on drugs and has been "used with increasing regularity." Since RICO, Congress has passed only two other forfeiture statutes: the Continuing Criminal Enterprise Act (CCE) and the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act (CDAPCA).

Section 1963(a) (1) of RICO was designed to effect an attack upon the economic bases of organized crime; the goal being to remove the incentive of capitalization through forfeiture (Cain, 1996).

The concept of RICO is to deny the intent of one or an association to conceptualize and or carry out a criminal conspiracy. It is also a check to recruit membership or diversity of such. In the United States most non-sundry felonies under U.S. jurisdiction at the state or federal level committed by an adult may be certified as a predicate act. Upon two such certifiable felonies, the prosecutor or petioner may ask the Court to certify the defendant(s) or respondent(s) as a RICO enterprise. An array of acts are covered which are known as racketeer influenced behavior. They are: intimidating a witness, hostage taking, kidnapping, and murder. In combination at any level of this structure may be blackmail and extortion.