U.S. Attorney Nicholas A. Klinefeldt announced today (Thursday), that the Southern District of Iowa collected more than $5.6-million in criminal and civil actions in Fiscal Year 2013. Of that amount, nearly $4.1-million was collected in criminal actions and slightly more than $1.5-million was collected in civil actions. In addition, the Southern District of Iowa worked with other U.S. Attorney’s Offices and components of the Department of Justice to collect an additional $4.1-million in civil cases pursued jointly with those offices.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Justice Department collected approximately $8.1 billion in civil and criminal actions in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30th, 2013. The more than $8 billion in collections in FY 2013 represents nearly three times the appropriated $2.76 billion budget for the 94 U.S. Attorney’s offices and the main litigating divisions in that same period.

The U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, along with the department’s litigating divisions, are responsible for enforcing and collecting civil and criminal debts owed to the U.S. and criminal debts owed to federal crime victims. The law requires defendants to pay restitution to victims of certain federal crimes who have suffered a physical injury or financial loss. While restitution is paid to the victim, criminal fines and felony assessments are paid to the department’s Crime Victims’ Fund, which distributes the funds to state victim compensation and victim assistance programs.

The U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of Iowa, working with partner agencies and divisions, also collected more than $2.3-million in administrative and judicial asset forfeiture actions in FY 2013. Forfeited assets are deposited into the Department of Justice Assets Forfeiture Fund and are used to restore funds to crime victims and for a variety of law enforcement purposes. $862,737 in forfeited assets was returned to victims during FY 2013, and $543,406 was equitably shared with state and local law enforcement agencies.