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TURKIYE HALK BANKASI A. S. v. UNITED STATES 

Syllabus 

in civil actions against foreign states and their instrumentalities does
not cover criminal cases.  Pp. 5–14.

(a) The  doctrine  of  foreign  sovereign 

immunity  originally
developed  in  U.  S.  courts  “as  a  matter  of  common  law”  rather  than 
statute.  Samantar v. Yousuf, 560 U. S. 305, 311.  In 1976, Congress 
enacted  the  FSIA,  which  prescribed  a  “comprehensive  set  of  legal
standards governing claims of immunity in every civil action against 
a foreign state.”  Verlinden B. V. v. Central Bank of Nigeria, 461 U. S. 
480, 488.  The text of the FSIA indicates that the statute exclusively
addresses civil suits.  The first provision grants district courts original
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.”    28  U. S. C.  §1330(a).    The  FSIA 
then sets forth a carefully calibrated set of procedures and remedies 
applicable exclusively in civil, not criminal, cases.  Further, Congress 
described  the  FSIA  as  defining  “the  circumstances  in  which  foreign 
states  are  immune  from  suit,”  not  from  criminal  investigation  or 
prosecution.  90 Stat. 2891.  In stark contrast, the FSIA is silent as to 
criminal matters, even though at the time of the FSIA’s enactment in
1976, the Executive Branch occasionally attempted to subject foreign-
government-owned  entities  to  federal  criminal  investigation.    If 
Halkbank  were  correct, 
from  criminal  prosecution 
undoubtedly  would  have  surfaced  somewhere  in  the  Act’s  text. 
Moreover,  the  FSIA’s  location  in  the  U.  S.  Code—Title  28,  which 
mostly concerns civil procedure, rather than Title 18, which addresses 
crimes and criminal procedure—likewise reinforces the interpretation
that  the  FSIA  does  not  apply  to  criminal  proceedings.  Finally,  this 
Court’s decision in Samantar, in which the Court analyzed the FSIA’s 
“text,  purpose,  and  history”  and  determined  that  the  FSIA’s
“comprehensive  solution”  for  suits  against  foreign  states  did  not 
extend  to  suits  against  individual  officials,  560  U. S.,  at  323,  325, 
similarly supports the conclusion here that the FSIA’s  provisions do
not extend to the discrete context of criminal proceedings.   Pp. 5–9.

immunity 

(b) In response to all the evidence of the FSIA’s exclusively civil
scope, Halkbank claims immunity from criminal prosecution based on 
one sentence in the FSIA, which provides that 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.”
28  U. S. C.  §1604.    Section  1604,  however,  must  be  considered  in 
context.  Section 1604 works in tandem with §1330(a):  Section 1330(a)
spells  out  a  universe  of  civil  cases  against  foreign  states  over  which 
district  courts  have  jurisdiction,  and  §1604  then  clarifies  how 
principles  of  immunity  operate  within  that  limited  civil  universe. 
Halkbank’s interpretation of §1604 is also difficult to square with its