I
118THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 137
To require an accounting of certain property forfeited to the United States,
and for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
JANUARY9, 2023
Mr. C
OHEN(for himself, Ms. SALAZAR, and Mr. FITZPATRICK) introduced the
following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary
A BILL
To require an accounting of certain property forfeited to
the United States, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Justice for Victims 4
of Kleptocracy Act of 2023’’. 5
SEC. 2. FORFEITED PROPERTY. 6
(a) I
NGENERAL.—Chapter 46 of title 18, United 7
States Code, is amended by adding at the end the fol-8
lowing: 9
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‘‘§ 988. Accounting of certain forfeited property 1
‘‘(a) A
CCOUNTING.—The Attorney General shall 2
make available to the public an accounting of any property 3
relating to foreign government corruption that is forfeited 4
to the United States under section 981 or 982. 5
‘‘(b) F
ORMAT.—The accounting described under sub-6
section (a) shall be published on the website of the Depart-7
ment of Justice in a format that includes the following: 8
‘‘(1) A heading as follows: ‘Assets stolen from 9
the people of llllll and recovered by the 10
United States’, the blank space being filled with the 11
name of the foreign government that is the target of 12
corruption. 13
‘‘(2) The total amount recovered by the United 14
States on behalf of the foreign people that is the tar-15
get of corruption at the time when such recovered 16
funds are deposited into the Department of Justice 17
Asset Forfeiture Fund or the Department of the 18
Treasury Forfeiture Fund. 19
‘‘(c) U
PDATEDWEBSITE.—The Attorney General 20
shall update the website of the Department of Justice to 21
include an accounting of any new property relating to for-22
eign government corruption that has been forfeited to the 23
United States under section 981 or 982 not later than 24
14 days after such forfeiture, unless such update would 25
compromise an ongoing law enforcement investigation.’’. 26
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(b) CLERICALAMENDMENT.—The table of sections 1
for chapter 46 of title 18, United States Code, is amended 2
by adding at the end the following: 3
‘‘988. Accounting of certain forfeited property.’’.
SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
4
It is the sense of Congress that recovered assets be 5
returned for the benefit of the people harmed by the cor-6
ruption under conditions that reasonably ensure the trans-7
parent and effective use, administration and monitoring 8
of returned proceeds. 9
Æ
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