Organized Crime

I have two kids, ages eight and nine. Let’s say that they are tiny little desperados (¹⁾ who, no matter how many times they get sent to their room as punishment for a particular “crime”, never learn their lesson.

Let’s go further and say that my kids repeatedly hatch a plan to sneak all of the candy in the house into their room and eat it after bedtime. Let’s also say that their plan involves my son breaking into the pantry and my daughter receiving and concealing said candy. And, let’s say they are caught red-handed the morning after the heists have been committed.

Let’s say that I want to REALLY punish them for this behavior, that from my “Mean Dad” perspective (²⁾  the typical punishment for breaking into the pantry and receiving and concealing the candy is just not harsh enough. What should I do?

Well, dear readers, the answer to this question is RICO. Not Uncle Rico (³⁾ from “Napoleon Dynamite”  (⁴⁾, but RICO: the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (⁵⁾.

I chose this topic for this month’s column because we are going to see a major RICO case play out over the next year or two out of the state of Georgia, regarding a certain politician (⁶⁾ who had a cameo role in the 1992 Christmas comedy film “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” (⁷⁾.

RICO is a federal and state law that provides for harsher penalties for individuals who commit acts as part of an ongoing criminal organization. Passed in 1970 and originally aimed toward prosecuting the mafia, this statute has since been used to target unions, police organizations and even the Catholic Church, to name a few.

The main idea behind RICO is to dismantle organizations. If you are prosecuting individuals in an organization separately, the organization still stands. But if you charge numerous individuals within an organization with committing separate acts in furtherance of the organization’s ongoing criminal purpose, it’s significantly easier to snuff out a whole group at once.

If I wanted to completely dismantle my children’s criminal enterprise, I would charge them under the RICO statute. The penalties are much harsher than if I simply punish them individually for their crimes. That is what RICO does. It’s a hammer the government uses – quite successfully – to stamp out organized criminal activity.

If I were to charge my kids under RICO for their crimes of breaking and entering and receiving and concealing, they would be looking at spending decades in Dad Jail … rather than just a few years.

1. They are good kids – not actual desperados.
2. To be clear, I might excuse this behavior as long as everyone is in bed at bedtime. Bedtime with young kids is a nightmare.
3. Who could absolutely throw a football over them mountains.
4. If you missed this reference, I do not apologize.
5. Bet you didn’t know what this acronym stood for.
   The government loves acronyms.
6. Politics are left at the door here; this is only about the law.
7. Referenced here only to mention that the injuries sustained by Harry and Marv in this movie and the civil liability issues could/should be addressed in their own column.