Opinion ID: 196165
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Extradition/Forfeiture.

Text: 131 Appellant asserts that the forfeiture entered against him violates the rule of specialty because it is tantamount to prosecution and conviction for an offense on which extradition was neither sought nor granted. He also suggests that the principle of dual criminality prohibits the forfeiture because Swiss law does not render a defendant criminally liable for forfeiture by reason of unlawful money transfers. These initiatives fail because they ignore the irresistible conclusion that, at least for present purposes, criminal forfeiture is a punishment, not a separate criminal offense. 132 We think that the genealogy of modern criminal forfeiture is important. The device is born out of the mating of two historically distinct traditions. One parent is civil forfeiture, an in rem proceeding rooted in the notion that property used in, or intimately associated with, criminal activity acquires a taint, and that such property is therefore forfeitable even if not owned by the miscreant. See United States v. Sandini, 816 F.2d 869, 872 (3d Cir.1987). The second parent is old-hat criminal forfeiture, which traditionally operated as an incident of a felony conviction in personam against a convicted defendant, requiring him to forfeit his property to the crown. See United States v. Nichols, 841 F.2d 1485, 1486 (10th Cir.1988). The forfeiture provisions of RICO combine both traditions because they act in personam against the defendant, yet require a nexus between the forfeited property and the crime. 25 See id. at 1486-88 (reviewing historical aspects of forfeiture); Saccoccia, 823 F.Supp. at 1001. 133 Partially as a result of this mixed heritage, courts have struggled to categorize the resultant hybrid--modern criminal forfeiture--as either a punishment for, or an element of, a criminal offense. The majority view regards criminal forfeiture for narcotics offenses under 21 U.S.C. Sec. 853 as part of the punishment imposed on a defendant. See, e.g., United States v. Elgersma, 971 F.2d 690, 694 (11th Cir.1992) (holding that criminal forfeiture is part of the sentencing process and not an element of the crime itself); United States v. Hernandez-Escarsega, 886 F.2d 1560, 1576-77 (9th Cir.1989) (similar), cert. denied, 497 U.S. 1003, 110 S.Ct. 3237, 111 L.Ed.2d 748 (1990); Sandini, 816 F.2d at 875 (similar). Other straws in the wind blow in the same direction. See, e.g., Alexander v. United States, --- U.S. ----, ----, 113 S.Ct. 2766, 2772, 125 L.Ed.2d 441 (1993) (characterizing a RICO forfeiture order against a pornography merchant as a punishment for past criminal conduct); United States v. Kingsley, 851 F.2d 16, 18 n. 2 (1st Cir.1988) (noting in dictum that in personam criminal forfeiture ... is intended to directly punish persons convicted of a criminal offense by forcing them to forfeit the proceeds obtained as a result of that offense). Withal, there remains some nagging doubt about whether forfeiture is strictly a punishment as opposed to a separate substantive charge. See, e.g., Caplin & Drysdale, Chtd. v. United States, 491 U.S. 617, 628 n. 5, 109 S.Ct. 2646, 2654 n. 5, 105 L.Ed.2d 528 (1989) (stating in dictum that forfeiture is a substantive charge in the indictment against a defendant); Fed.R.Crim.P. 31(e) advisory committee's note (noting committee's assumption that the amount of the interest or property subject to criminal forfeiture is an element of the offense to be alleged and proved). 134 We resolve that doubt favorably to the government to the extent necessary to rebut Saccoccia's claims. Thus, we hold that, for purposes of extradition law, forfeiture is neither a free-standing criminal offense nor an element of a racketeering offense under RICO, but is simply an incremental punishment for that proscribed conduct. Consequently, a defendant may be subjected to a forfeiture order even if extradition was not specifically granted in respect to the forfeiture allegations. We base this ruling primarily on three pillars: the weight of authority counsels in this direction; the punitive aspects of criminal forfeiture predominate (among other things, RICO forfeiture retains the functional traits of a punishment since it is definitively imposed only after the defendant's guilt has otherwise been determined); and, finally, treating criminal forfeiture as a punishment in the extradition milieu is consistent with the emphasis that the doctrine of dual criminality places on the unlawfulness of the defendant's conduct, and, correspondingly, on the lack of any requirement that a crime have identical elements or penalties in the two jurisdictions, see Collins, 259 U.S. at 312, 42 S.Ct. at 470-71; Levy, 905 F.2d at 328. 135 It follows, therefore, that appellant was properly subjected to a criminal forfeiture order even if he was not extradited on forfeiture charges and even if Swiss law does not provide for criminal forfeiture under comparable circumstances. 136