thank you could've made please the court richard bres for the city of almighty defendant victor crop off along with help from with help from his family misappropriated over three hundred million dollars from all mati afterwards defendants laundered into the united states tens of millions of dollars precisely in order to make it more difficult and more costly from ati to locate and recover the assets as a result almighty spent considerable sums in the united states to locate the assets here and to trace them here that constitutes a domestic injury both as a matter of common sense and perhaps even more importantly when you take into account the rationales that underlie the presumption against extraterritoriality this presumptions are to number one courts apply the presumption in recognition is just an of the common sense notion that congress normally acts with domestic concerns in mind when defendants in gauging criminal acts in the united states that cause foreign entities foreign sovereigns to expend money in the united states were incurred a liability in the united states providing a cause of action for redress is a matter of domestic concern interrupt you from and so i'm looking at the st injury is the three hundred million dollars that's not the rico claim here is to collect that if that if they had taken that money and put it in switzerland and we haven't had to spend any money in the united states to trace it down we wouldn't be making this rico injury that would allow us to to make it worthwhile to come to court because in other words if we saw the tracing understood where the money was the costs would be so minimal that i can't imagine that we'd bring a cause of action to collect them well in other  wouldn't be an expenditure but it but i think it matters it's not just about a quantification it's about whether there's a separate domestic injury and my understanding is that you're claiming a separate domestic injury because of the money it cost to raise the money as opposed to a separate injury here and it is a separate injury your honor because again without the money laundering into and within the united states which was of course the the crime or the act that we're suing about here it's the money laundering under nine hundred and fifty six without that we wouldn't be claiming that we had a domestic injury so if they just committed the act that they did in overseas we wouldn't be out saying there's a domestic injury it is the laundering into the united states and really a shell game within the united states that because just one of the st injuries though with the money was taken from the city that that was the real route to that right well that was taken the money that was the primary injury by city your honor but it's not the one that we're suing for under rico what that's what you need that money back you want that money back when absolutely injury the fact that it was launched it means that it was more difficult to retrieve it right your honor two different points number one we do want that money back of course not all of it in the united states and certainly not all of it's recoverable under rico we want the money back that's why we ended up spending the money we did in the united states to track down what we could so that in later attachment actions and the like we could try to obtain that money but it's the money laundering into the united states and through the united states that caused us to have to expend more money and it's that money we're complaining about your time the district court distinguished some of the cases in qatar and i additional funds and i think in many defendants money laundering concealed existence of profits so induced further contributions so there was a direct the money laundering  cases the district court of ruled on your theory that's the problem your honor that's exactly it is that it's correct that we're not claiming that the later money laundering circled around and contributed to the theft we're complaining about the injury caused by the money laundering if you a rd circuit district court decision involving money laundering there is anything controlling of course as to more general principles and i think this is important not only to the cases that we cited seventeen and eighteen and note three which concern whether just expenditures of money out of pocket expenditures of money constitute an injury to property and they say it does but this court has actually addressed that very question i'm it's done it twice your honor st in a case called line of businesses on line and then charge the money to rectify it in the particular case it in the particular circumstance i'm discussing here from that case one of the plaintiffs didn't pay off the extortion but rather paid a separate expert to go in and fix or met milot mitigate the damage done to them online i think that case is directly on point here because it was paying that rd party to fix the problem caused by the criminal requirement because obviously once they've stolen money and you have proof of stolen money you can bring an action against them and put a lien on all of their property if you get a judgment in your favor so it wasn't clear to me what was the the legal or practical assess of tracing so can you help me understand the term tracing here your honor to the extent that that they were seeking recovery for it under any need at this time to determine where their funds were yes but i guess i wasn't following because normally if somebody stolen money from you or has defrauded you or whatever  kazakhstan that would include restitution if you know we could ever have defendants present in kazakhstan we have that there's an action in switzerland a criminal investigation that again would obtain restitution which would bring the money back to us and  look forward to interest the way that's ongoing your honor and no there isn't a lawsuit that we've actually met with them in a particular jurisdiction yet obtained a judgment but in order to safeguard our ability eventually to what was going on it enabled them to continue to fool people and thus unable to continue to steal their money means had a couple of comments though just in its rationale as it was thinking through the question of money laundering that i think are helpful because what the money laundering peculiarly to be peculiarly to limit the damages that are available for money laundering to damages caused by that kind of a circular damage theory that they had let me take another run at it your honor if you read may's mays talks about the defendant's argument in that case that of course money laundering can't cause any real injuries because the injuries precede the money laundering or at least the underlying injury proceeds the money laundering and the court said well we understand that that's usually the case but congress didn't write anything that limits the ability to get damages to the extent that money laundering c another question too that you are stronger but if i have time left and you were at the interest in property the direct interest in property is the money that we spent and the end in order to investigators in order to find our assets here and in addition  themselves well sure and in this case just as if somebody takes my bike and walks across the street with it and goes up an alleyway that i am naturally going to follow to see where they're taking it so that i can someday get it back but you're saying the it in a cut a couple of different ways it says there has to be damage to business or property it says it has to be a concrete financial loss it says that only proximate cause is required it and then it's holding which is really going what was going understood as part of a personal injury claim so just when i think the us is so well in many ways i'm trying to corral that i realize that really distinguishing between honestly or that's the holding of diaz and cases that i was citing earlier eccentric actually cites d cases are not domestic injury cases your honor those cases address whether you have an injury to property at all and so i was answering that question is st domestic all i'd really like to get out your honor is that i think that this court should look at the question of where the expense where the injury occurred not just mechanically i think that the defendant is a continuation of the injury when the ok move when someone acts in the united states to whether extort defraud you move your money around in such a way that you are abroad and you are as a foreseeable result you spend money in the ited states you incur libeling united states that's an injury you suffer in the u s and none of the reasons that nabisco was looking out for how to decide this question are offended by that nabisco was very concerned with comedy and to bestow all of those cases are in they're concerned primarily is that he's pointed out with not extending u s law to actions or conduct that occurs abroad that's not additional here in this case kompany pushes the other way because a foreign sovereign or foreign person reasonably expects when they're victimized in the united states or forced to expend money or incur like those in united states the united states will provide laundering here in the united states there's two issues there your honor st of all if you look at the complaint the complaint at on the whole and multiple paragraphs essentially alleges and intangible harm that is as they stated in the opening argument and impedance of their ability to locate the property in on appeal they've shifted their argument a bit and they focus on just two parts of the complaint where they now allege that they actually spent substantial sum tracing or trying to locate the money but the complaint is absolutely devoid of any allegation that that money spent was ever in the united states there no allegation that almighty ever had any business or property including the money that it alleges that it spent to trace these assets in the united states even if we assume that the money they spent and it could have been for investigators in kazakhstan we don't know it's not alleged anywhere in the complaint even if they were able to allege or had alleged that the money that they spent was somehow dollars in the united states still under our jr you would look at where where is that injury actually felt and that injury is actually felt in the cars fiske that's where the injury has occurred and there are several classes life  injury is tracing the investigator fees and attorneys fees why is it felt only there because it's money expended by all marty and kazakhstan and that when you look at where someone suffers if they if they part with money the question is where do they suffer that you have a strict residency yes no i would look at where was the money where was the locus of the money that was spent because that's where you're deprived of the money and that's and that's that what i'm calling the theft there's the initial theft but he's making very clearly making a different argument about money expended here to trace real estate from beverly hills home to him beverly's health so are you saying if they think why are funds to a private detective agency in california because they're wiring funds from their banking cassocks they're feeling the injury in kazakhstan i am saying that there is that you have a case suppose i am saying that and that is my understanding that's what i mean by residency yes there are there are two cases that i would refer twenty eight one thousand eight hundred thank you a district court case from the southern district of california essentially it said that the complaint because the complaint did not allege the location of the funds expended and it was not reasonable to infer that the funds were located in the united states where the plaintiff was a foreign corporation the allegation of expenditures of fun was not a sufficient domestic injury under our jr the other one i would cite would be the government of letter misappropriation domesticity or that the funds were paid from us based bank accounts my point in this is essentially that for all the plaintiffs arguments on appeal in the if you look at the complaint it's utterly devoid of even an allegation of domestic injury those words don't appear in the complaint and the allegations in the complaint of the harm that almighty allegedly suffered from all marty and thereby causing on lucky to have to devote substantial monies and time to use extraordinary means in the united states have with their funds in the united states yes what i understand that's what i have understood their allegation to be can you tell me why that inadequate so because st of all the harming them in terms of their ability to trace is an intangible right and nd of all there it might be sufficient in some other case but it's not sufficient based on the allegations in the complaint here because as i said there's no allegation that all marty had any business or property in the united states including the money that it says that it's spent because they have to allege an injury to a business or property in the united states if they're going to rely on those downstream effects and there's numerous cases including the school in that say you cannot rely on those downstream effects where your original injury is in a foreign country which is a separate reason why the district court should be affirmed because those allegations in the complaint don't allege that it was any business or property in the united states as r j are nabisco requires that they refer to tracing and time and using extraordinary means in the united states is they add enough to say they're spending money it in the united states or they're spending their money and the at the united states i think it's not your honor because they don't actually identify any specific business or property in the united states that was injured and paragraph one hundred and ten defendants harmed ahmadi by feeling those concealing allegation i'm real interested in knowing why you think that's not sufficient i think it's not sufficient because it's a derivative injury as the case is have said including by school and if the court were to reverse the district court here and hold that that was sufficient you would be creating a circuit split with you and you would be essentially eviscerating the the domestic injury requirement of r j r because it would mean that all anyone would have to do to allege a rico domestic injury no matter where the obviously it would be different and again i don't know that the court has to go on these sort of what if because if you look at the complaint here and if you look at the facts alleged here i think it's not sufficient that's that's funds taken out of you know mr misusing a power of attorney right to use and would steal money out of a us bank account right in that instance the property that the plaintiff is deprived of was located in the united states at the time of the misappropriation and so that's clearly sufficient but why is this insufficient this is really qualitatively different because the spending of money as i said after the fact after the original theft in kazakhstan is a derivative injury as all the courts have noted it's not and under rico you have to look at where does the original injury to simply we've said india that you have to separate in trees you have to look at them separately he's so so i will grant everything you have to say about the original theft that's my word overseas but it would be much more helpful for me if you could if the case is because and rico itself which says that you have to allege and injury to business or property in the united states there are voluntary expenditure of funds here as they actually admit in their reply brief i think they have to proceed overseas to try to get a judgment if they get the judgment are you really contending that they they they don't have an obligation to try to keep track of this money before it's just the vanished not at all not at all your honor and i don't know on the overseas i do want to point out one thing th e swiss proceeding has been closed without any criminal charges in switzerland but no i think that's the way they should have gone is if like what is the weather to if they have a foreign judgment they want to come here and force a foreign judgment on their remedy yes but they don't have to white why is it the case that they have to wait to take any any steps in the meantime the money will be that's their theory the money will be the most they won't be they find it is they really are content to not take you know it's not at all they don't have to wait they can take those steps they can try to locate the assets they're absolutely free to do that that's a voluntary act on their part the point is it's not domestic injury to property caused by the defendants rico conduct i think that  they can't sue under rico they may have other remedies but they cannot sue under rico because that voluntary expenditure of funds in the united states which they concede in their reply brief was not caused by the underlying rico they would have done fact that the plaintiff was a foreign corporation that was actually doing business in the united states it had preexisting property and business in the united states and then through an american subsidiary they got an american arbitral award in the united states the collection of which the defendants frustrated so the defendants x and frustrating the collection of that award were part of the underlying rico predicate that is not true here the plain of spending  purchased property that had to be pursued here and i don't know that i agree that it was told a voluntary they had an obligation to recover these funds that were stolen from the government well let yes understand i don't know that they had an obligation they might have had an obligation as i said they're perfectly free to do that all i'm saying is that that expenditure of fund is not a domestic injury under rico under best under the cases that hold that those sorts of inner injuries are derivative of the original fraud or conduct in the foreign country  d the allegations again in this complaint are not even remotely similar to the sort of fraud that happened at the tomb where the fraudulent conduct was all currying in the united states and the the frustration of the defendant ability to collect its money also was part of that original predicate of rico and the problem a large problem with this case is that the whole all of the allegations in the complaint there are a series of roots traps that really lack any underlying factual support in the complaint including the allegation that the money spent here or the property here is somehow traceable to or or belongs to al saying is that the allegations in the complaint that the property here is actually all marty's are are on their face insufficient there's no one a geisha and they haven't traced it we don't know we don't there's no connection between the property here and the  original sale of land in kazakhstan in violation of some cars laws there is no connection here other than an allegation and complaint on information and belief that the property is traceable but there's no facts in the complaint that would support that just a simple fact plate number two i point to aka show as a good case to look at in terms of where an injury is felt that's one where there was an internet scheme a scam and people overseas sent money from overseas into the united states for cars number three no circuits but with buskin there was no allegation biskit in that the money laundering caused an independent injury number for diaz says that secondary effects can still be injury in this circuit and it doesn't so this notion of downstream doesn't apply and shouldn't logically number for touching that there wasn't a us subsidiary that was suing in that case the court noted that the company had a us hub but the injury wasn't traced in any way to that