Cite as: 524 U. S. 1 (1998)
Opinion of the Court
"[n]o activity of money laundering . . . occurred in Missouri." Id., at 11a, 14a.
On the Government's appeal, the Eighth Circuit affirmed the District Court's dismissal of the money-laundering counts. 109 F. 3d 471, as amended, 115 F. 3d 621 (CA8 1997). The conspiracy charge was not part of the appeal, and that count remains pending in the Missouri District Court. 109 F. 3d, at 472, n. 2, as amended, 115 F. 3d 621.
The Court of Appeals first recounted law that is not in doubt: "Both Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and the Constitution require that a person be tried for an offense where that offense is committed," 109 F. 3d, at 472; also, the site of a charged offense " 'must be determined from the nature of the crime alleged and the location of the act or acts constituting it,' " ibid. (quoting United States v. Anderson, 328 U. S. 699, 703 (1946)). "Continuing offenses," the Court of Appeals recognized, those "begun in one district and completed in another," 18 U. S. C. § 3237(a), may be tried " 'in any district in which such [an] offense was begun, continued, or completed.' " 109 F. 3d, at 472 (quoting § 3237(a)).
But "Cabrales was not accused of a 'continuing offense,' " the Eighth Circuit said, ibid.; "[s]he was charged with money laundering, for transactions which began, continued, and were completed only in Florida," ibid. "That the money came from Missouri is of no moment," the Court of Appeals next observed, for "Cabrales dealt with it only in Florida." Ibid. The money-laundering counts "include[d] no act committed by Cabrales in Missouri," the Eighth Circuit emphasized, nor did "the [G]overnment charge that Cabrales transported the money from Missouri to Florida." Ibid.
The Government urges that, in conflict with the Eighth Circuit, other Courts of Appeals "have held that venue for money laundering offenses is proper in the district in which the funds were unlawfully generated, even if the financial transaction that constitutes the laundering occurred wholly within another district." Pet. for Cert. 9-10 (citing United
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