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Page Number: 19.0

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TYLER v. HENNEPIN COUNTY 

GORSUCH, J., concurring 

purpose, even a predominantly remedial purpose.  So long
as the law “cannot fairly be said solely to serve a remedial 
purpose,”  the  Excessive  Fines  Clause  applies.  Ibid.  (em-
phasis added; internal quotation marks omitted).  Nor, this 
Court has held, is it appropriate to label sanctions as “re-
medial”  when  (as  here)  they  bear  “ ‘no  correlation  to  any
damages sustained by society or to the cost of enforcing the
law,’ ” and “any relationship between the Government’s ac-
tual costs and the amount of the sanction is merely coinci-
dental.”  Id., at 621–622, and n. 14. 

Second,  the  District  Court  asserted  that  the  Minnesota 
tax-forfeiture scheme cannot “be punitive because it actu-
ally confers a windfall on the delinquent taxpayer when the
value  of  the  property  that  is  forfeited  is  less  than  the
amount of taxes owed.”  505 F. Supp. 3d, at 896.  That ob-
servation may be factually true, but it is legally irrelevant. 
Some  prisoners  better  themselves  behind  bars;  some  ad-
dicts  credit  court-ordered  rehabilitation  with  saving  their 
lives.  But punishment remains punishment all the same.
See Tr. of Oral Arg. 61.  Of course, no one thinks that an 
individual who profits from an economic penalty has a win-
ning excessive-fines claim.  But nor has this Court ever held 
that a scheme producing fines that punishes some individ-
uals  can  escape  constitutional  scrutiny  merely  because  it
does not punish others. 

Third,  the  District  Court  appears  to  have  inferred  that 
the Minnesota scheme is not “punitive” because it does not 
turn on the “culpability” of the individual property owner. 
505 F. Supp. 3d, at 897.  But while a focus on “culpability” 
can  sometimes  make  a  provision  “look  more  like  punish-
ment,”  this  Court  has  never  endorsed  the  converse  view. 
Austin, 509 U. S., at 619.  Even without emphasizing culpa-
bility, this Court has said a statutory scheme may still be
punitive where it serves another “goal of punishment,” such 
as  “[d]eterrence.”  United  States  v.  Bajakajian,  524  U. S. 
321, 329 (1998).  And the District Court expressly approved