The Supreme Court Overturns Significant Purpose of Georgia's RICO Statute

I was proud to be a part of this effort as the author of the amicus brief filed by the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (GACDL.) 

If there were ever a statute that deserved to be struck, it was this one.  In the case, police seized the appellant's home, his business, his bank accounts, the money in his wallet, the watch from his wrist, and appointed a "receiver" to administer his property.  The receiver hit his property to the tune of about half a million dollars.

He was never arrested or charged with a crime, but he was compelled to give up his fifth amendment rights or have his silence be construed as an admission for purposes of salvaging all that he owned.

The Supreme Court of Georgia extended to him and to those similarly situation all the rights afforded to the accused in a criminal matter and found that the in personam provisions of Georgia's RICO statute are unconstitutional.

Check out some of the coverage here.  The opinion is here.