R.I. U.S. Attorney’s Office collected $3M in criminal, civil actions in FY14

PROVIDENCE – The Rhode Island U.S. Attorney’s Office collected just over $3 million in criminal and civil actions in fiscal 2014, according to U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha.

Of that amount, $1.3 million was collected in criminal actions, and $1.8 million was collected in civil actions.

Rhode Island also worked with other U.S. attorneys’ offices and the Department of Justice to collect an additional $718,652.67 in cases pursued jointly with those offices.

Attorney General Eric Holder said recently that the U.S. Justice Department collected $24.7 billion in civil and criminal actions in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30.

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“Every day, the Justice Department’s federal prosecutors and trial attorneys work hard to protect our citizens, to safeguard precious taxpayer resources and to provide a valuable return on investment to the American people,” Holder said in a statement. “Their diligent efforts are enabling us to achieve justice and recoup losses in virtually every sector of the U.S. economy. And this result shows the fruits of the Justice Department’s tireless work in enforcing federal laws; in protecting the American people from violent crime, national security threats, discrimination, exploitation, and abuse; and in holding financial institutions accountable for their roles in causing the 2008 financial crisis.”

Said Neronha, the U.S. attorney for Rhode Island, in prepared remarks, “Those who engage in financial fraud, taking advantage of victims or the public generally, will continue to receive the full attention of both this office’s civil and criminal divisions, as will those who pose a threat to national security, who violate the public trust, who commit crimes of violence or who engage in sex trafficking, particularly of minors.”

The law requires defendants to pay restitution to victims of certain federal crimes who have suffered a physical injury or financial loss. And while restitution is paid to the victim, criminal fines and felony assessments are paid to the department’s crime victims’ fund, which distributes the funds to state victim compensation and victim assistance programs.

The largest civil collections were from affirmative civil enforcement cases, in which the United States recovered government money lost to fraud or other misconduct or collected fines imposed on individuals and/or corporations for violations of federal health, safety, civil rights or environmental laws.

Additionally, the U.S. attorney’s office in Rhode Island, working with partner agencies and divisions, collected $1,078,781 in asset forfeiture actions in fiscal 2014. Forfeited assets deposited into the Department of Justice Assets Forfeiture Fund are used to restore funds to crime victims and for a variety of law enforcement purposes.

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