U.S. Supreme Court Gives Narrow Definition to U.S. Money-Laundering Law in United States v. Santos

On June 2, 2008, an uncharacteristic line-up of Justices in a court divided 5 to 4 threw federal anti-money laundering law into a state of, if not chaos, then certainly confusion. Focusing on the undefined word ?proceeds? in 18 U.S.C. § 1956(a)(1)(A)(i), a majority of the Court agreed on the narrow holding that in a prosecution of a stand-alone gambling operation, the government was required to prove that the ?financial transaction? at issue involved profits, not merely gross receipts, from the ?specified unlawful activity? of gambling...[more]