Do "We, the People" have a civil RICO claim against Delay, RNC

[BR_Parkway]

and the rest of the vast right wing conspiracy?

Damages awarded are three times the amount, we could pay off a few credit cards or afford some heating oil this winter, at least.

• A RICO claim cannot exist in the absence of criminal activity. The simplest way to put this concept is: no crime - no RICO violation. This rule applies even in the context of civil RICO claims. Every RICO claim must be based upon a violation of one of the crimes listed in 18 U.S.C. § 1961(1). The RICO Act refers to such criminal activity as racketeering activity. RICO claims cannot be based upon breach of contract, broken promises, negligence, defective product design, failed business transactions, or any number of other factual scenarios that may give rise to other claims under the common law. This being said, a RICO claim can be based upon violations of the criminal mail and wire fraud statutes. The mail and wire fraud statutes are very broad. Some creative lawyers have succeeded in arguing that the mail and wire fraud statutes have been violated by fact patterns that superficially appear to give rise only to claims of negligence, breach of contract, and other actions giving rise to common law rights. If a RICO claim is based only upon violations of the mail or wire fraud statutes, however, courts are likely to subject the claims to stricter scrutiny. Courts look more favorably upon RICO claims based upon true criminal behavior, such as bribery, kickbacks, extortion, obstruction of justice, and clearly criminal schemes that are advanced by the use of the mails and wires.
  
  
  
• RICO addresses long-term, not one-shot, criminal activity. Not only must a RICO claim be based upon criminal activity, but the criminal acts must constitute a "pattern" of criminal activity. A single criminal act, short-term criminal conduct, or criminal actions that bear no relationship to each other will not give rise to a RICO claim. The United States Supreme Court has ruled that criminal actions constitute a "pattern" only if they are related and continuous. In order to be "related," the criminal acts must involve the same victims, have the same methods of commission, involve the same participants, or be related in some other fashion. A pattern may be sufficiently continuous if the criminal actions occurred over a substantial period of time or posed a threat of indefinite duration. The former patterns are referred to as closed-ended patterns; the latter patterns are referred to as open-ended patterns. Accordingly, even if you have been injured by a criminal act, you will not have a RICO claim unless that criminal act is part of a larger pattern of criminal activity.
  
  
  
• Your claim may be barred by the statute of limitations if you discovered or reasonably should have discovered your injury four or more years ago. Many people are mistaken that civil RICO claims are not subject to a statute of limitations. True, Congress failed to include a statute of limitations when it passed the RICO Act, but the United States Supreme Court has remedied that oversight and imposed a four-year statute of limitations on all civil RICO claims. Civil Rico's statute of limitations begins to run when the victim discovers or reasonably should have discovered its injury. Many people also believe that the statute of limitations is reset every time a new criminal act is committed - this is not true. Once a victim is aware or should be aware of its injury, the victim has four years to discover the remaining elements of its claim and bring suit. A victim cannot sit on its rights and refrain from filing suit in the face of known injuries. That being said, however, there are several equitable doctrines that may toll or suspend the running of the statute of limitations. If a defendant fraudulently conceals facts that are essential to the victim's ability to purse its rights, the running of the statute of limitations may be tolled. In addition, acts of duress, such as "if you sue me, I'll kill you," may toll the running of the statute of limitations. All tolling doctrines are based upon whether it is fair, under the circumstances, to bar the victim's claims on the basis of the running of the statute of limitations. Also, if a defendant engages in a new pattern of rackeeting, that causes new and independent injuries, a new limitations period may apply to those new and independent injuries.
  
  http://www.ricoact.com/ricoact/nutshell.asp