Asset Forfeiture Funds: Changes Needed To Enhance Congressional Oversight: Statement Before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Federal Spending, Budget and Accounting

• NCJ Number: 156645
• Author(s): G L Dodaro
• Date Published: 1987
• Length: 26 pages
• Corporate Author: US Government Accountability Office
• Sale Source: Azimuth Inc.; National Institute of Justice/; NCJRS Photocopy Services
• Publication Type: Legislative Hearing/Committee Report
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: DCC

Annotation

The U.S. General Accounting Office examined the operation of the Forfeiture Funds maintained by the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Customs Service in order to ascertain how receipts and expenses are accounted for.

Abstract

The GAO found that in the Justice Department Fund, rapidly increasing revenues were accumulating which could be spent at the Department's discretion, with little congressional oversight. Despite significant increases in expenditures, Justice's Fund had a balance of $88 million as of August 1987, compared to a balance of $5 million the previous year. The U.S. Customs Service, in contrast, was required to transfer surplus funds to the U.S. Treasury at the end of each year. To improve control and oversight of the Customs Fund, the GAO recommended that recordkeeping procedures be streamlined, that reports to Congress be prepared more accurately and completely, and that the existing accounting system be modified in order to improve the reliability of receipts and expenses charged against the Fund. 3 appendixes