holmes v. securities investor protection corporation.pdfVIP

Louisiana Law R eview Volume 53 | Number 6 J uly 1993 Holmes v. Securities Investor Protection Corporation: Prox imate Cause Dims the Bright- Lines of RICO Standing Daniel Joseph Shapiro Repository Citation Daniel Joseph Shapiro, Holmes v. Securities Investor Protection Corp oration: Proximate Cause Dims the Brig ht-Lines of RI CO Standing, 53 La. L. Rev. (1993) Available at : http://di /lalrev/vol53/iss6/6 This Note is brought to you for free and open access by the Law R eviews and Journals at Di italCommons @ LSU Law Center. It has been accepted for inclusion in Louisiana Law R eview by an authorized administrator of Di italCommons @ LSU Law Center. For more information, please contact sarah.buras@. NOTES Holmes v. SecuritiesInvestor Protection Corporation: Proximate Cause Dims the Bright-Lines of RICO Standing INTRODUCTION The Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organization Act,2 generally known as RICO, permits persons injured by reason of violations of the prohibitions therein to recover threefold the damages sustained. Because of RICOs broad prohibitions, limitations on this hefty express remedy were sought. Several such limitations proved successful at the federal circuit level, but did not survive United States Supreme Court scrutiny. Although RICO has recently been significantly limited by the pattern requirement expressed in H.J.Inc. v. NorthwesternBell 4 Telephone Co., it remains subject to further limitation. Recent attempts to limit the civil RICO action resemble prior unsuccessful attempts in that they focus on the nature or cause of the injury to determine standing. These recent attempts to limit RICO through narrow standing requirements use easily administered rules, or bright-line tests which permit co