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U.S. Supreme Court

Does extortion conspiracy require outsider victim? Supreme Court agrees to decide

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to consider the scope of a federal law prohibiting conspiracy to commit extortion in a case involving police officers who received kickbacks from a car repair shop.

The Supreme Court granted cert on Monday, SCOTUSblog reports. At issue is whether a conspiracy to commit extortion under the Hobbs Act requires an agreement to obtain property from someone outside the conspiracy, according to the cert petition (PDF).

The case involves an alleged scheme in Baltimore in which police officers received payments to refer car-accident victims to a car repair shop, SCOTUSblog reports in prior coverage. “In other words,” the cert petition says, the defendant police officers are accused of “conspiring with their bribers to obtain property from the bribers themselves.”

The Hobbs Act defines extortion as “the obtaining of property from another, with his consent, … under color of official right.”

The case is Ocasio v. United States.