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Summary:
Federal courts may not order a defendant to pay restitution to the victims of his or her crimes unless authorized to do so. Several statutes supply such authorization. For instance, federal courts are statutorily required to order victim restitution when sentencing a defendant for a felony that constitutes either a crime of violence or an offense against property, including fraud or deceit proscribed in title 18 of the United States Code. The obligation exists even if the defendant is indigent, and restitution must take the form of in-kind or installment payments. Moreover, a court may not order restitution as required by the statute and then grant the defendant remission of restitution. Ordinarily, however, restitution is available only to victims who have suffered a physical injury or financial loss as a direct and proximate consequence of the crime of conviction, and only to the extent of their losses. In addition, federal courts are permitted to order victim restitution when sentencing a defendant for various controlled substance and aviation safety offenses, or any felony proscribed in Title 18 of the United States Code for which restitution is not mandatory. Moreover, a federal court may make restitution a condition of probation or supervised release. When restitution is to be ordered, a probation officer prepares a report after gathering information from victims, the government, and the defendant. The parties receive copies of the report and may contest its recommendations. The court has considerable discretion as to the manner and scheduling of restitution payments, but the authority may not be delegated to probation or prison officials. Furthermore, the order must provide for full restitution for all victims unless the sheer number of victims or the complications of a given case preclude such an order. This is an abridged version of a longer report, CRS Report RL34138, Restitution in Federal Criminal Cases, without the footnotes and citations to authority found in the longer report. Related reports include CRS Report RL34139, Criminal Restitution Proposals in the 110th Congress, available in an abridged version as CRS Report RS22709, Criminal Restitution in the 110th Congress: A Sketch, all by Charles Doyle.
