§384 — Title 33 Navigation and Navigable Waters | U.S. Code

Summary

If a ship was built, bought, fitted out, kept, or used for piracy, or if piracy was first tried from it, and it is captured and brought into a U.S. port, a U.S. admiralty court (a court that handles ship and sea cases) must hear the case. If the court finds it was used for piracy, the court must declare the ship forfeited, order it sold, and divide the proceeds between the United States and the people who captured it as the court decides.

Title 33, §384

Navigation and Navigable Waters — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

Whenever any vessel, which shall have been built, purchased, fitted out in whole or in part, or held for the purpose of being employed in the commission of any piratical aggression, search, restraint, depredation, or seizure, or in the commission of any other act of piracy as defined by the law of nations, or from which any piratical aggression, search, restraint, depredation, or seizure shall have been first attempted or made, is captured and brought into or captured in any port of the United States, the same shall be adjudged and condemned to their use, and that of the captors after due process and trial in any court having admiralty jurisdiction, and which shall be holden for the district into which such captured vessel shall be brought; and the same court shall thereupon order a sale and distribution thereof accordingly, and at its discretion.

Editorial Notes

Codification R.S. § 4296 derived from acts Mar. 3, 1819, ch. 77, § 4, 3 Stat. 513; Jan. 30, 1823, ch. 7, 3 Stat. 721; Aug. 5, 1861, ch. 48, § 1, 12 Stat. 314.

§384 Condemnation of piratical vessels

Summary

Title 33, §384

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

Citations & Metadata