546
Opinion of the Court
John H. Weston argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs was G. Randall Garrou.
Solicitor General Starr argued the cause for the United States. With him on the brief were Assistant Attorney General Mueller, Deputy Solicitor General Bryson, and Paul J. Larkin, Jr.*
Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court.
After a full criminal trial, petitioner Ferris J. Alexander, owner of more than a dozen stores and theaters dealing in sexually explicit materials, was convicted on, inter alia, 17 obscenity counts and 3 counts of violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). The obscenity convictions, based on the jury's findings that four magazines and three videotapes sold at several of petitioner's stores were obscene, served as the predicates for his three RICO convictions. In addition to imposing a prison term and fine, the District Court ordered petitioner to forfeit, pursuant to 18 U. S. C. § 1963 (1988 ed. and Supp. III), certain assets that were directly related to his racketeering activity as punishment for his RICO violations. Petitioner argues that this forfeiture violated the First and Eighth Amendments to the Constitution. We reject petitioner's
*Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression et al. by Michael A. Bamberger; for the American Civil Liberties Union et al. by Marvin E. Frankel, Steven R. Shapiro, and Marjorie Heins; for the American Library Association et al. by Bruce J. Ennis, Jr., and David W. Ogden; for Feminists for Free Expression by Helen M. Mickiewicz; and for the Video Software Dealers Association by Charles B. Ruttenberg, James P. Mercurio, and Theodore D. Frank.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for Christian Legal Defense by Wendell R. Bird and David J. Myers; for the National Family Legal Foundation et al. by James P. Mueller and Len L. Munsil; for Morality in Media, Inc., by Paul J. McGeady; and for the Religious Alliance Against Pornography et al. by H. Robert Showers.
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