Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-09-05190/USCOURTS-caDC-09-05190-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued October 22, 2009 Decided July 16, 2010 

 

No. 09-5065 

IN RE: ANY AND ALL FUNDS OR OTHER ASSETS, IN BROWN 

BROTHERS HARRIMAN & CO. ACCOUNT #8870792 IN THE 

NAME OF TIGER EYE INVESTMENTS LTD., ET AL., 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

APPELLANT

v. 

OPPORTUNITY FUND AND TIGER EYE INVESTMENTS, LTD., 

APPELLEES

Consolidated with 09-5164, 09-5190 

Appeals from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 1:08-mc-00807-JDB) 

 Jean B. Weld, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, 

argued the cause for appellant. With her on the briefs were 

Linda M. Samuel and Daniel H. Claman, Attorneys. R. Craig 

Lawrence, Assistant U.S. Attorney, entered an appearance. 

USCA Case #09-5190 Document #1255619 Filed: 07/16/2010 Page 1 of 17
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 Kelly B. Kramer argued the cause for appellee 

Opportunity Fund. With him on the brief was Anjali 

Chaturvedi. 

 Andrew C. Lourie argued the cause for appellee Tiger 

Eye Investments, Ltd. With him on the brief were Michael S. 

Kim and Lara Levinson. 

 Before: ROGERS, GARLAND, and KAVANAUGH, Circuit 

Judges. 

 Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge

KAVANAUGH. 

 KAVANAUGH, Circuit Judge: The U.S. Government 

seeks a court order under 28 U.S.C. § 2467(d)(3) to freeze the 

assets of individuals and entities who are the subjects of an 

ongoing criminal investigation by the Brazilian government 

for possible violations of Brazilian law. 

 Before entering the fog of statutory analysis, it is 

important to carefully identify the power being asserted here. 

The U.S. Government is claiming authority under 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2467(d)(3) – a provision enacted into law in 2001 – to 

freeze a person’s assets for a period that could be years, 

including the assets of U.S. citizens, (i) based solely on a 

foreign official’s allegation that the owner of the assets 

violated that country’s law, (ii) before any foreign court has 

decided whether the owner of the assets is actually guilty of a 

legal violation, and (iii) without any right for the owner of the 

assets to obtain substantive judicial review in a U.S. court of 

the basis for the freeze order, even just for probable cause that 

the owner committed an offense. 

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 The precise statutory question we must decide is whether 

property may be frozen under § 2467(d)(3) only after a 

foreign court has entered a forfeiture judgment, as the District 

Court concluded, or also may be frozen even before any such 

foreign court forfeiture judgment, as the Government posits. 

Like the District Court, we interpret the statute to mean that a 

U.S. court may freeze assets under § 2467(d)(3) only after a 

foreign court’s forfeiture judgment. 

 In so ruling, we make two points clear up front. First, the 

Government has expressly acknowledged that the statutory 

authority it claims here is not used in national security 

matters, presumably because a variety of other statutes give 

the Government power to freeze and forfeit property for 

national security reasons. Second, this case does not involve 

or affect the U.S. Government’s ability to freeze or forfeit 

assets for alleged or proved violations of U.S. law. This case 

concerns only whether § 2467(d)(3) grants the U.S. 

Government the power to freeze assets based solely on a 

foreign official’s allegation of a violation of that country’s 

law, and before any foreign court has adjudicated the matter. 

I 

 In late 2008, the government of Brazil submitted a formal 

request for assistance under the Treaty Between the 

Government of the United States of America and the 

Government of the Federative Republic of Brazil on Mutual 

Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters, U.S.-Braz., Oct. 14, 

1997, S. TREATY DOC. NO. 105-42 (1998). The Brazilian 

authorities asked the United States to freeze (i) accounts held 

by the Opportunity Fund, a Cayman Islands investment fund, 

at UBS AG in Connecticut, and (ii) an account held by Tiger 

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Eye Investments, Ltd. at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. in 

New York. 

 The affidavit accompanying the Brazilian request alleged, 

based on an ongoing Brazilian criminal investigation, that 

Daniel and Veronica Dantas had perpetrated a scheme to 

defraud the Brazilian financial system, engage in insider 

trading, and launder the proceeds of those crimes. Many of 

those activities, the affidavit stated, were carried out through 

the Opportunity Fund and Tiger Eye Investments. 

 In late 2008 and early 2009, based on information 

contained in the affidavit, the United States Department of 

Justice filed a series of applications in the U.S. District Court 

for the District of Columbia for restraining orders against 

accounts held by the Opportunity Fund and Tiger Eye. As 

authority for its applications, the Government cited 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2467(d)(3), which authorizes a district court to issue “a 

restraining order pursuant to section 983(j) of title 18” in 

order to “preserve the availability of property subject to a 

foreign forfeiture or confiscation judgment.” 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2467(d)(3)(A). 

 As relevant to the substantive issue presented here, the 

District Court ultimately concluded in two decisions – one in 

March 2009 and one in May 2009 – that § 2467(d)(3) did not 

authorize it to issue restraining orders until a Brazilian court 

issued a forfeiture or confiscation judgment. Because no such 

foreign court judgment had yet issued, the District Court 

denied the U.S. Government’s application for restraining 

orders. 

 

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II 

 We first explain our jurisdiction to hear this appeal under 

28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1). 

 The courts of appeals have jurisdiction to review district 

court decisions “granting, continuing, modifying, refusing or 

dissolving injunctions, or refusing to dissolve or modify 

injunctions.” 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1). Under this statute, we 

have appellate jurisdiction to review the District Court’s 

granting or denying of a preliminary injunction. See Davis v. 

Pension Benefit Guar. Corp., 571 F.3d 1288, 1291 (D.C. Cir. 

2009). A restraining order lasting longer than 14 days 

generally is considered an injunction, the granting or denying 

of which is subject to appeal. See Sampson v. Murray, 415 

U.S. 61, 86 (1974); United States v. E-Gold, Ltd., 521 F.3d 

411, 414-15 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (order restraining “assets 

pending trial and judgment” is an “injunction” under 28 

U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1)). Here, the relevant restraining orders 

sought by the Government – and ultimately denied by the 

District Court – would have lasted far longer than 14 days. 

Therefore, the District Court’s March decision (which 

dissolved prior injunctions that had already lasted longer than 

14 days and would have continued indefinitely) and its May 

decision (denying an injunction that would have lasted longer 

than 14 days) are appealable under § 1292(a)(1). 

 We thus proceed to the merits of the statutory dispute. In 

analyzing the statute, we exercise de novo review. See United 

States v. Sheehan, 512 F.3d 621, 629 (D.C. Cir. 2008). 

III 

 Before 2000, the U.S. could forfeit assets at the request of 

a foreign government only by instituting independent 

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forfeiture proceedings in a U.S. Court based on alleged 

violations of U.S. law. 

In 2000, Congress passed and President Clinton signed 

the Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act, Pub. L. No. 106-185, 

§ 15, 114 Stat. 202, 219-21 (2000). That Act included most 

of what is now 28 U.S.C. § 2467. Section 2467 grants federal 

district courts jurisdiction to enforce “foreign forfeiture or 

confiscation judgment[s]” and to “enter such orders as may be 

necessary to enforce the judgment on behalf of the foreign 

nation.” 28 U.S.C. § 2467(c)(1), (d)(1). The statute thus 

allows the U.S. Government to forfeit assets based on the 

existence of a foreign court judgment; no longer does the U.S. 

Government need to institute independent forfeiture 

proceedings based on violations of U.S. law in order to seize 

such property. 

In 2001, Congress passed and President Bush signed the 

Patriot Act, a wide-ranging piece of legislation that included 

what is now 28 U.S.C. § 2467(d)(3). That provision 

authorizes federal district courts to issue temporary 

restraining orders to “preserve the availability of property 

subject to a foreign forfeiture or confiscation judgment.” Id. 

§ 2467(d)(3)(A). 

The statutory issue before us is whether property may be 

frozen under § 2467(d)(3) only after a foreign court has 

entered a forfeiture judgment, or also may be frozen even 

before any such foreign court forfeiture judgment. 

A 

 

By its plain text, § 2467(d)(3) allows U.S. courts to issue 

temporary restraining orders to preserve property “subject to a 

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foreign forfeiture or confiscation judgment” – not to preserve 

property “subject to foreign forfeiture or confiscation.” 

Standing alone, the phrase “subject to a foreign forfeiture or 

confiscation judgment” is more naturally read to mean that 

the foreign court’s judgment already has been entered, not 

that a judgment might be issued in the future. 

Moreover, Congress knows the difference between 

“subject to forfeiture” and “subject to a forfeiture judgment.” 

Congress has repeatedly used the phrase “subject to 

forfeiture” to describe property that may be forfeited in a 

future proceeding. E.g., 8 U.S.C. § 1324(b)(1); 16 U.S.C. 

§ 470gg(b); id. § 668b(b); id. § 742j-1(e); id. § 972f(c); id. 

§ 1171(a); id. § 1417(c); id. § 1437(e)(1); id. § 1540(e)(4)(A); 

18 U.S.C. § 981(a)(1); id. § 983(a)(1)(A)(iii); 19 U.S.C. 

§ 1497(a)(1)(B)(ii); 21 U.S.C. § 881(a); 26 U.S.C. § 7303; id.

U.S.C. § 7608(a)(4); 30 U.S.C. § 1466(a). In other statutes, 

by contrast, Congress has used the phrase “subject to a final 

order” or decision, and those laws plainly contemplate a 

decision or order that already has been issued. E.g., 5 U.S.C. 

§ 1215(a)(4) (“subject to a final order”); 7 U.S.C. § 12d 

(“subject to a final decision or order”); 29 U.S.C. § 1872 

(“subject to a final order”). 

Here, Congress chose to include the word “judgment” in 

§ 2467(d)(3) and to define “forfeiture or confiscation 

judgment” in § 2467(a)(2) as “a final order of a foreign 

nation.” Congress’s decision to include the word “judgment” 

suggests that assets may be frozen under § 2467(d)(3) only 

after a foreign court has entered a forfeiture judgment. 

Congress’s deliberate choice must be respected. Cf. Lopez v. 

Gonzales, 549 U.S. 47, 56 (2006); Gozlon-Peretz v. United 

States, 498 U.S. 395, 404-05 (1991). 

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B 

In attempting to overcome the significance of the word 

“judgment” in § 2467(d)(3), the Government offers five main 

arguments. 

First, the Government cites other language in the 

statutory text that, it says, contemplates that the Government 

can obtain a restraining order even before a foreign court 

judgment. For example, § 2467(d)(3)(B)(i) states that a court, 

in deciding whether to issue a restraining order, may rely on 

“an affidavit describing the nature of the proceeding or 

investigation underway in the foreign country” and on 

documents “setting forth a reasonable basis to believe that the 

property to be restrained will be named in a judgment of 

forfeiture at the conclusion of such proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2467(d)(3)(B)(i) (emphasis added). Section 2467(d)(3)(C) 

provides that the property owner may not challenge the 

application for the restraining order based on a ground also 

raised in the litigation “pending” in the foreign court. The 

Government argues that those statutory phrases obviously 

contemplate a future foreign judgment. 

But the key fact that makes sense of those statutory 

provisions – and that undermines the Government’s position 

here – is that forfeitures are often a two-stage process, as the 

Government acknowledged at oral argument. See Tr. of Oral 

Arg. at 25-26. In the first stage, a foreign court renders a 

forfeiture or confiscation judgment against an individual or 

entity – that is, a judgment “compelling a person or entity . . . 

to pay a sum of money . . . .” 28 U.S.C. § 2467(a)(2). In 

many instances, however, the specific assets that must be 

seized to give effect to that judgment are unknown at the time. 

That leads to the second stage, which culminates in a separate 

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judgment of forfeiture naming the specific property to be 

forfeited. 

With that two-stage reality in mind, we read the language 

of § 2467(d)(3)(B)(i) and (d)(3)(C) to refer to the process that 

precedes entry of the second-stage judgment naming the 

property to be forfeited. That approach both makes sense of 

those prospective elements of the overall statutory scheme 

and respects the congressional decision to use the word 

“judgment” in § 2467(d)(3) as the prerequisite for a 

restraining order. 

That approach also corresponds to the difference in 

language between § 2467(a)(2) and (d)(3)(B)(i). Section 

2467(a)(2) anticipates a forfeiture judgment against a person 

or entity as the prerequisite for a freeze order. Section 

2467(d)(3)(B)(i) in turn contemplates a judgment of forfeiture 

naming the property to be restrained as something that will 

occur after the freeze order. 

Contrary to the Government’s contention, the nuanced 

statutory language meshes nicely with the two-stage foreign 

forfeiture process. 

Second, the Government suggests that § 2467(d)(3)’s 

cross-reference to § 983(j) of Title 18 justifies reading 

§ 2467(d)(3) as authorizing property restraints before a 

foreign judgment. As previously noted, § 2467(d)(3) provides 

that “the Government may apply for, and the court may issue, 

a restraining order pursuant to section 983(j)” to “preserve the 

availability of property subject to a foreign forfeiture or 

confiscation judgment.” Id. § 2467(d)(3)(A). 

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Section 983(j) is a general provision that authorizes the 

temporary restraint of assets “subject to civil forfeiture” as a 

result of violations of U.S. law. Section 983(j) in essence 

provides a model for how restraining orders will be issued 

under § 2467(d)(3). The Government points out that § 983(j) 

allows the restraint of property “subject to civil forfeiture,” 

which contemplates a civil forfeiture judgment in the future. 

18 U.S.C. § 983(j)(1). But that prospective language does not 

answer the question here about § 2467(d)(3). As already 

discussed, foreign forfeiture often is a two-stage process – an 

initial foreign forfeiture or confiscation judgment against a 

person or entity followed by a subsequent judgment naming 

the property to be forfeited. So the fact that § 983(j) is 

prospectively focused on a future judgment does not answer 

the question in this case. After all, our reading of the statute 

contemplates a future judgment – the second-stage judgment 

– naming the property to be forfeited. 

Third, the Government argues that requiring a foreign 

judgment as a prerequisite to a freeze order would render 

meaningless the 2001 statutory amendment that added 

§ 2467(d)(3). Not so. The 2001 amendment specified the 

procedures for issuing restraining orders based on foreign 

court judgments. That amendment thereby eliminated some 

of the uncertainty about how courts were to go about 

preserving and restraining the assets of a person or entity 

subject to a foreign court judgment. Congress had made the 

major legislative decision on this issue in 2000, when it first 

decided that the U.S. Government could forfeit assets based 

on a foreign court’s judgment (and not only based on 

suspected or actual violations of U.S. law). The 2001 

amendment filled in some gaps left by the 2000 legislation 

and made sure that the assets of a guilty party could be frozen 

once the foreign judgment against the individual had been 

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entered, even though the second-stage judgment naming the 

property had not yet occurred. 

 Recall that § 2467(d)(1) – part of the original 2000 

enactment – states that a “district court shall enter such orders

as may be necessary to enforce the judgment on behalf of the 

foreign nation.” Id. § 2467(d)(1) (emphasis added). That 

general phrasing left room for litigants to argue that property 

could not be temporarily restrained or frozen until the 

property itself was named in a judgment of forfeiture – in 

other words, only after the second stage of the two-stage 

foreign forfeiture process. Section 2467(d)(3) eliminated that 

uncertainty by expressly providing for temporary restraining 

orders before the second-stage judgment. Section 2467(d)(3) 

also outlined what kinds of evidence can be used when the 

Government attempts to obtain those restraining orders and 

makes clear that U.S. courts cannot consider the same 

challenges being raised in the foreign court. In the absence of 

these statutory clarifications, district courts would have been 

left to their own devices to figure out whether temporary 

restraining orders were permitted at all before a foreign 

judgment naming the property was issued, what forms of 

evidence would be admissible in deciding to issue those 

restraining orders, and whether U.S. courts could consider the 

same arguments being addressed in the foreign court. 

In short, we reject the Government’s contention that our 

reading renders the 2001 amendment meaningless. 

Fourth, the Government cites legislative history in the 

form of a Report of the House Committee on Financial 

Services. As an initial matter, the Committee Report provides 

conflicting evidence on whether § 2467(d)(3) was meant to 

allow the restraint of property before a foreign judgment. For 

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example, the Report indicates that § 2467(d)(3) was meant to 

give federal courts the authority to enforce “foreign forfeiture 

judgment[s].” H.R. REP. NO. 107-250, pt. 1, at 59 (2001). 

That statement supports our reading because it refers to a 

judgment. That said, the Report also provides that the 2001 

amendment was meant “to include a mechanism for 

preserving property subject to forfeiture in a foreign country.” 

Id. (emphasis added). That statement tends to support the 

Government’s reading. So the legislative history may point in 

both directions, at least insofar as the House Report does not 

refer to a two-stage forfeiture process. 

Of course, even if this lone Report from one Committee 

of one House did support the Government’s reading of 

§ 2467(d)(3), the statutory text controls. As a general matter, 

“it is the statute, and not the Committee Report, which is the 

authoritative expression of the law.” City of Chicago v. Envtl. 

Def. Fund, 511 U.S. 328, 337 (1994); see also Exxon Mobil 

Corp. v. Allapattah Servs., Inc., 545 U.S. 546, 568 (2005) 

(“As we have repeatedly held, the authoritative statement is 

the statutory text, not the legislative history or any other 

extrinsic material.”). And here, the relevant statutory text 

says “subject to a foreign forfeiture or confiscation 

judgment,” not “subject to forfeiture.” We cannot disregard 

the congressional intent reflected in that statutory text. 

Fifth, the Government points to policy interests 

supporting its reading of § 2467(d)(3). If the U.S. 

Government is unable to restrain assets before there is a 

foreign forfeiture judgment against the person or entity, then 

those assets might disappear before they can be restrained. 

And if the U.S. does not help other countries restrain assets 

before the foreign trial, it allegedly will not meet its 

obligations under the Vienna Convention; as a result, other 

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countries might be hesitant to restrain assets for the U.S in 

similar circumstances. 

To begin with, the Government indicated at oral 

argument that § 2467(d)(3) has been invoked in attempts to 

obtain pre-judgment restraining orders only 10 to 12 times in 

the last decade – approximately once a year. See Tr. of Oral 

Arg. at 4. The Government has expressly stated, moreover, 

that this provision is not used in national security cases. Id. at 

71.1

 Furthermore, a separate statute – § 981 of Title 18 – was 

designed to meet the U.S.’s obligations under the Vienna 

Convention. 

In considering the Government’s policy arguments, 

which we of course take very seriously, we must note that 

there are strong policy interests on the other side as well. 

Section 2467(d)(3) applies to U.S. citizens and noncitizens 

alike, as the Government acknowledged at oral argument. See 

id. at 5. So under the Government’s interpretation, a U.S. 

citizen’s assets could be frozen for years – without any 

meaningful substantive judicial review in a U.S. court – based 

merely on the request of a foreign official and the prospect 

that the property owner might one day be found guilty or 

liable in a foreign court. Here, as elsewhere, it is difficult to 

 1

 There are a number of statutory tools available to the 

Government when it seeks to freeze assets in the name of national 

security. See, e.g., 8 U.S.C. § 1189(a)(2)(C) (Secretary of Treasury 

can require freezing of assets linked to foreign terrorist 

organizations); 18 U.S.C. § 981(a)(1)(G) (assets of persons 

perpetrating terrorism against the U.S. or U.S. persons or property 

can be forfeited); id. § 1956(c)(7)(D) (forfeiture is available for 

various terrorism and terrorism-related crimes); 50 U.S.C. 

§ 1702(a) (President has the authority to freeze assets of foreign 

persons or organizations engaged in hostilities against the U.S.). 

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believe Congress would “enact so significant a [measure] 

without a clear indication of its purpose to do so.” United 

States v. O’Brien, 130 S. Ct. 2169, 2172 (2010). Congress 

does not typically hide elephants in mouseholes, and the 

Government’s assertion of authority in this case qualifies as 

such an elephant. Cf. Whitman v. American Trucking Ass’ns, 

531 U.S. 457, 468 (2001). 

In any event, regardless of how one might ultimately 

balance and resolve the policy arguments, policy 

considerations alone cannot transform the content of a 

statute’s text. It is not a court’s role to substitute its “view of 

. . . policy for the legislation which has been passed by 

Congress.” Florida Department of Revenue v. Piccadilly 

Cafeterias, Inc., 128 S. Ct. 2326, 2339 (2008) (internal 

quotation marks omitted). In this case, as we have repeatedly 

explained, the word “judgment” in the statutory text is critical 

and indicates how Congress itself authoritatively struck the 

balance between the competing policy considerations. 

Of course, if the Department of Justice wants Congress to 

expand the Government’s authority, the Department can so 

recommend to the Legislative Branch. Indeed, the 

Government’s counsel told us at oral argument that the 

Department of Justice is already working on such draft 

legislation. 

* * * 

We affirm the District Court’s March 2009 and May 

2009 decisions rejecting the Government’s applications for 

restraining orders. 

 So ordered. 

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APPENDIX 

§ 2467. Enforcement of foreign judgment 

(a) Definitions. – In this section – 

 

(2) the term “forfeiture or confiscation judgment” 

means a final order of a foreign nation compelling a 

person or entity – 

(A) to pay a sum of money representing the 

proceeds of an offense described in Article 3, 

Paragraph 1, of the United Nations Convention, 

any violation of foreign law that would 

constitute a violation or an offense for which 

property could be forfeited under Federal law if 

the offense were committed in the United States, 

or any foreign offense described in section 

1956(c)(7)(B) of title 18, or property the value 

of which corresponds to such proceeds; or 

(B) to forfeit property involved in or traceable to 

the commission of such offense. 

* * * 

 (d) Entry and Enforcement of Judgment. – 

(1) In general. – The district court shall enter such 

orders as may be necessary to enforce the judgment 

on behalf of the foreign nation unless the court finds 

that – 

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(A) the judgment was rendered under a system 

that provides tribunals or procedures 

incompatible with the requirements of due 

process of law; 

(B) the foreign court lacked personal jurisdiction 

over the defendant; 

(C) the foreign court lacked jurisdiction over the 

subject matter; 

(D) the foreign nation did not take steps, in 

accordance with the principles of due process, to 

give notice of the proceedings to a person with 

an interest in the property of the proceedings in 

sufficient time to enable him or her to defend; or 

(E) the judgment was obtained by fraud. 

(2) Process. – Process to enforce a judgment under 

this section shall be in accordance with rule 69(a) of 

the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. 

(3) Preservation of property. – 

(A) In general. – To preserve the availability of 

property subject to a foreign forfeiture or 

confiscation judgment, the Government may 

apply for, and the court may issue, a restraining 

order pursuant to section 983(j) of title 18, at 

any time before or after an application is filed 

pursuant to subsection (c)(1) of this section. 

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(B) Evidence. – The court, in issuing a 

restraining order under subparagraph (A) – 

 

(i) may rely on information set forth in an 

affidavit describing the nature of the 

proceeding or investigation underway in the 

foreign country, and setting forth a 

reasonable basis to believe that the property 

to be restrained will be named in a 

judgment of forfeiture at the conclusion of 

such proceeding; or 

(ii) may register and enforce a restraining 

order that has been issued by a court of 

competent jurisdiction in the foreign 

country and certified by the Attorney 

General pursuant to subsection (b)(2). 

(C) Limit on grounds for objection. – No person 

may object to a restraining order under 

subparagraph (A) on any ground that is the 

subject of parallel litigation involving the same 

property that is pending in a foreign court. 

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