Case Summary:

Ellingburg v. United States involves a federal defendant, Holsey Ellingburg Jr., who robbed a First Union National Bank before the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 (MVRA) became law, but was sentenced after its enactment and ordered to pay $7,567.25 in restitution under that Act. Ellingburg committed the bank robbery in 1995, was indicted in 1996 on federal bank robbery charges, pleaded guilty, and received a prison term plus a restitution order to the bank, which he has still not fully paid. Years later, he challenged his ongoing restitution obligation under the Ex Post Facto Clause on the ground that applying the MVRA to conduct predating its April 24, 1996 effective date retroactively increased his punishment. The Eighth Circuit rejected his claim after treating MVRA restitution as a nonpunitive, civil measure and therefore outside the Ex Post Facto Clause, prompting the grant of certiorari. In the Supreme Court, both Ellingburg and the United States agreed that the lower court was wrong and that MVRA restitution is criminal punishment, so the Court appointed an amicus curiae, John F. Bash, to defend the Eighth Circuit’s judgment. The issue before the Supreme Court was whether restitution ordered under the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 constitutes criminal punishment, rather than a civil remedy, for purposes of applying the Ex Post Facto Clause to a defendant whose offense occurred before the MVRA’s enactment.