18 U.S.C. § 1594 addresses attempts, conspiracies, and forfeiture in the federal trafficking and slavery chapter. The attempt and conspiracy lists are not identical, and the penalty must be matched to the actual subsection. Victim restitution is separately addressed by Section 1593. [1] [2]
Match the charge to the correct provision
Subsection (a) punishes attempts to commit its listed offenses in the same manner as completed violations. Subsection (b) uses a different list for conspiracies and likewise ties punishment to the referenced offense. Subsection (c) separately provides any term of years or life for a conspiracy to violate Section 1591. Do not assume every conspiracy simply receives the identical statutory treatment as every completed predicate. [1]
The prosecution still must establish the charged attempt or agreement and the elements required by the applicable law. A general trafficking label does not identify the accused person’s role or the specific offense.
Forfeiture concerns identified property interests
Section 1594 includes criminal and civil forfeiture provisions addressing property involved in, used or intended to facilitate, or derived from covered violations, with the statutory tracing rules. The legal basis for each asset should be identified. [1]
Forfeiture and restitution are different remedies. A property seizure is not automatically a final forfeiture determination, and ownership, tracing, procedural rights, and the applicable legal process matter. Someone asserting an interest should preserve documents showing the source, ownership, and use of the property rather than assume the asset’s proximity to the defendant resolves every question.
Restitution focuses on the victim’s losses
Section 1593 requires restitution for covered offenses and defines the full loss framework. It includes the statutory comparison involving the value or gross income from the victim’s labor or services and applicable wage guarantees. The calculation is not limited to wages the defendant voluntarily promised to pay. [2]
Keep the charging documents, predicate statutes, loss evidence, and asset records separate enough to show which issue each supports. An attempt or conspiracy charge can have consequences even where the alleged offense was not completed, while the restitution and forfeiture analyses retain their own statutory requirements. A careful assessment therefore identifies the exact count, punishment provision, property theory, and victim-loss calculation instead of treating all four as one automatic consequence. [1] [2]
Related questions
See federal criminal forfeiture and RICO charges and enterprise liability.
Primary sources
Sources checked: October 31, 2026.