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10 

TURKIYE HALK BANKASI A. S. v. UNITED STATES 

Opinion of the Court 

2 
In  response  to  all  of  that  evidence  of  the  FSIA’s
exclusively civil scope, Halkbank emphasizes a sentence of 
the FSIA codified at 28 U. S. C. §1604:  “Subject to existing
international  agreements,”  a  “foreign  state  shall  be 
immune  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  courts  of  the  United
States and of the States except as provided in sections 1605 
to  1607  of  this  chapter.”    Halkbank  contends  that  §1604 
renders  it  immune  not  only  from  civil  suits  but  also  from
criminal prosecutions.

In complete isolation, §1604 might be amenable to that
reading.  But this Court has a “duty to construe statutes, 
not  isolated  provisions.”    Graham  County  Soil  and  Water 
Conservation Dist. v. United States ex rel. Wilson, 559 U. S. 
280,  290  (2010)  (internal  quotation  marks  omitted).    And 
the Court must read the words Congress enacted “in their
context  and  with  a  view  to  their  place  in  the  overall 
statutory  scheme.”    Davis  v.  Michigan  Dept.  of  Treasury, 
489  U. S.  803,  809  (1989).  When  we  consider  §1604 
alongside  its  neighboring  FSIA  provisions,  it  becomes
overwhelmingly  evident  that  §1604  does  not  grant 
immunity  to  foreign  states  and  their  instrumentalities  in
criminal matters. 

Section  1330(a)  is  the  place  to  start.  This  Court  has 
explained that “Sections 1604 and 1330(a) work in tandem.” 
Argentine  Republic  v.  Amerada  Hess  Shipping  Corp.,  488 
U. S. 428, 434 (1989).  Indeed, the public law containing the 
FSIA begins with §1330 and then later follows with §1604. 
See  90  Stat.  2891–2892.  Recall  that  §1330(a)  confers
district-court  jurisdiction  over  “any  nonjury  civil  action 
against  a  foreign  state”  as  to  “any  claim  for  relief  in 
personam  with  respect  to  which  the  foreign  state  is  not
entitled to immunity.”  Section 1604 then confers immunity
on foreign states unless an enumerated statutory exception
applies.  See §§1605–1607. 

Reading  the  two  provisions  together  (as  we  must)  and