Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 571

529US2

Unit: $U51

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496

BECK v. PRUPIS

Opinion of the Court

therance of a RICO conspiracy has a cause of action under
§ 1964(c), even if the overt act is not an act of racketeering.
We conclude that such a person does not have a cause of
action under § 1964(c).

I
A

Congress enacted RICO as Title IX of the Organized
Crime Control Act of 1970, Pub. L. 91–452, 84 Stat. 922, for
the purpose of “seek[ing] the eradication of organized crime
in the United States,” id., at 923. Congress found that “or-
ganized crime in the United States [had become] a highly
sophisticated, diversiﬁed, and widespread activity that an-
nually drain[ed] billions of dollars from America’s economy
by unlawful conduct and the illegal use of force, fraud, and
corruption.”
Id., at 922. The result was to “weaken the
stability of the Nation’s economic system, harm innocent
investors and competing organizations, interfere with free
competition, seriously burden interstate and foreign com-
merce, threaten the domestic security, and undermine the
general welfare of the Nation and its citizens.”
Id., at 923.
Finding the existing “sanctions and remedies available to
the Government [to be] unnecessarily limited in scope and
impact,” Congress resolved to address the problem of or-
ganized crime “by strengthening the legal tools in the
evidence-gathering process, by establishing new penal prohi-
bitions, and by providing enhanced sanctions and new reme-
dies to deal with the unlawful activities of those engaged in
organized crime.”

Ibid.

RICO attempts to accomplish these goals by providing
severe criminal penalties for violations of § 1962, see § 1963,
and also by means of a civil cause of action for any person
“injured in his business or property by reason of a violation
of section 1962,” 18 U. S. C. § 1964(c) (1994 ed., Supp. IV).1

1 RICO also authorizes the Government to bring civil actions to “prevent

and restrain” violations of § 1962.

18 U. S. C. §§ 1964(a) and (b).