ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS et al.

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214 OCTOBER TERM, 2007
Syllabus
ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS et al.
certiorari to the united states court of appeals for
the eleventh circuit
No. 06–9130. Argued October 29, 2007—Decided January 22, 2008
The Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) waives the United States’ sovereign
immunity for claims arising out of torts committed by federal employ
ees, see 28 U. S. C. § 1346(b)(1), but, as relevant here, exempts from that
waiver “[a]ny claim arising in respect of the assessment or collection of
any tax or customs duty, or the detention of any . . . property by any
officer of customs or excise or any other law enforcement officer,”
§ 2680(c). Upon his transfer from an Atlanta federal prison to one in
Kentucky, petitioner noticed that several items were missing from his
personal property, which had been shipped to the new facility by the
Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). Alleging that BOP officers had lost
his property, petitioner filed this suit under, inter alia, the FTCA, but
the District Court dismissed that claim as barred by § 2680(c). Affirm
ing, the Eleventh Circuit rejected petitioner’s argument that the statu
tory phrase “any officer of customs or excise or any other law enforce
ment officer” applies only to officers enforcing customs or excise laws.
Held: Section 2680(c)’s text and structure demonstrate that the broad
phrase “any other law enforcement officer” covers all law enforcement
officers. Petitioner’s argument that § 2680(c) is focused on preserving
sovereign immunity only for officers enforcing customs and excise laws
is inconsistent with the statute’s language. “Read naturally, the word
‘any’ has an expansive meaning, that is, ‘one or some indiscriminately of
whatever kind.’ ” United States v. Gonzales, 520 U. S. 1, 5. For exam
ple, in considering a provision imposing an additional sentence that was
not to run concurrently with “any other term of imprisonment,” 18
U. S. C. § 924(c)(1), the Gonzales Court held that, notwithstanding the
subsection’s initial reference to federal drug trafficking crimes, the ex
pansive word “any” and the absence of restrictive language left “no
basis in the text for limiting” the phrase “any other term of imprison
ment” to federal sentences. 520 U. S., at 5. To similar effect, see
Harrison v. PPG Industries, Inc., 446 U. S. 578, 588–589, in which the
Court held that there was “no indication whatever that Congress in
tended” to limit the “expansive language” “ ‘any other final action’ ” to
particular kinds of agency action. The reasoning of Gonzales and Har
rison applies equally to 28 U. S. C. § 2680(c): Congress’ use of “any” to
modify “other law enforcement officer” is most naturally read to mean
law enforcement officers of whatever kind. To be sure, the text’s refer

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ences to “tax or customs duty” and “officer[s] of customs or excise” indi
cate an intent to preserve immunity for claims arising from an officer’s
enforcement of tax and customs laws. The text also indicates, however,
that Congress intended to preserve immunity for claims arising from
the detention of property, and there is no indication of any intent that
immunity for those claims turns on the type of law being enforced. Re
cent amendments to § 2680(c) restoring the sovereign immunity waiver
for officers enforcing any federal forfeiture law, see § 2680(c)(1), support
the Court’s conclusion by demonstrating Congress’ view that, prior
to the amendments, § 2680(c) covered all law enforcement officers.
Against this textual and structural evidence, petitioner’s reliance on the
canons of statutory construction ejusdem generis and noscitur a sociis
and on the rule against superfluities is unconvincing. The Court is un
persuaded by petitioner’s attempt to create ambiguity where the stat
ute’s structure and text suggest none. Had Congress intended to limit
§ 2680(c)’s reach as petitioner contends, it easily could have written “any
other law enforcement officer acting in a customs or excise capacity.”
Instead, it used the unmodified, all-encompassing phrase “any other law
enforcement officer.” This Court must give effect to the text Congress
enacted. Pp. 217–228.
204 Fed. Appx. 778, affirmed.
Thomas, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Roberts, C. J.,
and Scalia, Ginsburg, and Alito, JJ., joined. Kennedy, J., filed a dis
senting opinion, in which Stevens, Souter, and Breyer, JJ., joined, post,
p. 228. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, J.,
joined, post, p. 243.
Jean-Claude Andre´, by appointment of the Court, 551
U. S. 1186, argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the
briefs were Michael G. Smith, Peter K. Stris, Shaun P. Mar
tin, and Brendan Maher.
Kannon K. Shanmugam argued the cause for respond
ents. With him on the brief were Solicitor General Clem
ent, Assistant Attorney General Keisler, Deputy Solicitor
General Kneedler, and Mark B. Stern.
Justice Thomas delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case concerns the scope of 28 U. S. C. § 2680, which
carves out certain exceptions to the United States’ waiver of
sovereign immunity for torts committed by federal employ
ees. Section 2680(c) provides that the waiver of sovereign

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216 ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
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immunity does not apply to claims arising from the detention
of property by “any officer of customs or excise or any other
law enforcement officer.” Petitioner contends that this
clause applies only to law enforcement officers enforcing cus
toms or excise laws, and thus does not affect the waiver of
sovereign immunity for his property claim against officers of
the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). We conclude that the
broad phrase “any other law enforcement officer” covers all
law enforcement officers. Accordingly, we affirm the judg
ment of the Court of Appeals upholding the dismissal of peti
tioner’s claim.
I
Petitioner Abdus-Shahid M. S. Ali was a federal prisoner
at the United States Penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia, from
2001 to 2003. In December 2003, petitioner was scheduled
to be transferred to the United States Penitentiary Big
Sandy (USP Big Sandy) in Inez, Kentucky. Before being
transferred, he left two duffle bags containing his personal
property in the Atlanta prison’s Receiving and Discharge
Unit to be inventoried, packaged, and shipped to USP Big
Sandy. Petitioner was transferred, and his bags arrived
some days later. Upon inspecting his property, he noticed
that several items were missing. The staff at USP Big
Sandy’s Receiving and Discharge Unit told him that he had
been given everything that was sent, and that if things were
missing he could file a claim. Many of the purportedly miss
ing items were of religious and nostalgic significance, includ
ing two copies of the Qur’an, a prayer rug, and religious mag
azines. Petitioner estimated that the items were worth
$177.
Petitioner filed an administrative tort claim. In denying
relief, the agency noted that, by his signature on the receipt
form, petitioner had certified the accuracy of the inventory
listed thereon and had thereby relinquished any future
claims relating to missing or damaged property. Petitioner
then filed a complaint alleging, inter alia, violations of the

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Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U. S. C. §§ 1346, 2671
et seq. The BOP maintained that petitioner’s claim was
barred by the exception in § 2680(c) for property claims
against law enforcement officers. The District Court agreed
and dismissed petitioner’s FTCA claim for lack of subject
matter jurisdiction. Petitioner appealed.
The Eleventh Circuit affirmed, agreeing with the District
Court’s interpretation of § 2680(c). 204 Fed. Appx. 778, 779–
780 (2006) (per curiam). In rejecting petitioner’s argu
ments, the Court of Appeals relied on this Court’s broad
interpretation of § 2680(c)’s “detention” clause in Kosak v.
United States, 465 U. S. 848, 854–859 (1984), on decisions
by other Courts of Appeals, and on its own decision in
Schlaebitz v. United States Dept. of Justice, 924 F. 2d 193,
195 (1991) (per curiam) (holding that United States Mar
shals, who were allegedly negligent in releasing a parolee’s
luggage to a third party, were “law enforcement officers”
under § 2680(c)). See 204 Fed. Appx., at 779–780.
We granted certiorari, 550 U. S. 968 (2007), to resolve the
disagreement among the Courts of Appeals as to the scope
of § 2680(c).1
II
In the FTCA, Congress waived the United States’ sov
ereign immunity for claims arising out of torts committed
1 The Eleventh Circuit joined five other Courts of Appeals in construing
§ 2680(c) to encompass all law enforcement officers. See Bramwell v. Bu
reau of Prisons, 348 F. 3d 804, 806–807 (CA9 2003); Chapa v. United States
Dept. of Justice, 339 F. 3d 388, 390 (CA5 2003) (per curiam); Hatten v.
White, 275 F. 3d 1208, 1210 (CA10 2002); Cheney v. United States, 972
F. 2d 247, 248 (CA8 1992) (per curiam); Ysasi v. Rivkind, 856 F. 2d 1520,
1525 (CA Fed. 1988). Five other Courts of Appeals reached the contrary
conclusion, interpreting the clause as limited to officers performing cus
toms or excise functions. See ABC v. DEF, 500 F. 3d 103, 107 (CA2 2007);
Dahler v. United States, 473 F. 3d 769, 771–772 (CA7 2007) (per curiam);
Andrews v. United States, 441 F. 3d 220, 227 (CA4 2006); Bazuaye v.
United States, 83 F. 3d 482, 486 (CADC 1996); Kurinsky v. United States,
33 F. 3d 594, 598 (CA6 1994).

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by federal employees. See 28 U. S. C. § 1346(b)(1). As
relevant here, the FTCA authorizes “claims against the
United States, for money damages . . . for injury or loss of
property . . . caused by the negligent or wrongful act or
omission of any employee of the Government while acting
within the scope of his office or employment.” Ibid. The
FTCA exempts from this waiver certain categories of claims.
See §§ 2680(a)–(n). Relevant here is the exception in subsec
tion (c), which provides that § 1346(b) shall not apply to “[a]ny
claim arising in respect of the assessment or collection of any
tax or customs duty, or the detention of any goods, merchan
dise, or other property by any officer of customs or excise or
any other law enforcement officer.” § 2680(c).
This case turns on whether the BOP officers who allegedly
lost petitioner’s property qualify as “other law enforcement
officer[s]” within the meaning of § 2680(c).2 Petitioner ar
gues that they do not because “any other law enforcement
officer” includes only law enforcement officers acting in a
customs or excise capacity. Noting that Congress refer
enced customs and excise activities in both the language at
issue and the preceding clause in § 2680(c), petitioner argues
that the entire subsection is focused on preserving the
United States’ sovereign immunity only as to officers enforc
ing those laws.
Petitioner’s argument is inconsistent with the statute’s
language.3 The phrase “any other law enforcement officer”
2 We assume, without deciding, that the BOP officers “detained” Ali’s
property and thus satisfy § 2680(c)’s “arising in respect of . . . detention”
requirement. The Court of Appeals held that the “detention” clause was
satisfied, and petitioner expressly declined to raise the issue on certiorari.
See 204 Fed. Appx. 778, 779–780 (CA11 2006) (per curiam); Brief for Peti
tioner 10–11, n. 9.
3 We consider this question for the first time in this case. Petitioner
argues that this Court concluded in Kosak v. United States, 465 U. S. 848
(1984), that the phrase “any other law enforcement officer” is ambiguous.
Reply Brief for Petitioner 4. In that case, the Court construed a portion

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suggests a broad meaning. Ibid. (emphasis added). We
have previously noted that “[r]ead naturally, the word ‘any’
has an expansive meaning, that is, ‘one or some indiscrimi
nately of whatever kind.’ ” United States v. Gonzales, 520
U. S. 1, 5 (1997) (quoting Webster’s Third New International
Dictionary 97 (1976)). In Gonzales, we considered a provi
sion that imposed an additional sentence for firearms used in
federal drug trafficking crimes and provided that such addi
tional sentence shall not be concurrent with “ ‘any other term
of imprisonment.’ ” 520 U. S., at 4 (quoting 18 U. S. C.
§ 924(c)(1) (1994 ed.); emphasis deleted). Notwithstanding
the subsection’s initial reference to federal drug trafficking
crimes, we held that the expansive word “any” and the ab
sence of restrictive language left “no basis in the text for
limiting” the phrase “any other term of imprisonment” to
federal sentences. 520 U. S., at 5. Similarly, in Harrison
v. PPG Industries, Inc., 446 U. S. 578 (1980), the Court con
sidered the phrase “any other final action” in amendments to
the Clean Air Act. The Court explained that the amend
ments expanded a list of Environmental Protection Agency
Administrator actions by adding two categories of actions:
actions under a specifically enumerated statutory provision,
and “any other final action” under the Clean Air Act. Id.,
at 584 (emphasis deleted). Focusing on Congress’ choice of
the word “any,” the Court “discern[ed] no uncertainty in the
meaning of the phrase, ‘any other final action,’ ” and empha
sized that the statute’s “expansive language offer[ed] no indi
of the same clause at issue here, but the decision had no bearing on the
meaning of “any other law enforcement officer.” 465 U. S., at 853–862
(holding that “detention” encompasses claims resulting from negligent
handling or storage). Indeed, the Court expressly declined to reach the
issue. Id., at 852, n. 6 (“We have no occasion in this case to decide what
kinds of ‘law-enforcement officer[s],’ other than customs officials, are cov
ered by the exception” (alteration in original)). Petitioner’s reliance on
the footnote as concluding that the phrase is ambiguous reads too much
into the Court’s reservation of a question that was not then before it.

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cation whatever that Congress intended” to limit the phrase
to final actions similar to those in the specifically enumerated
sections. Id., at 588–589.
We think the reasoning of Gonzales and Harrison applies
equally to the expansive language Congress employed in 28
U. S. C. § 2680(c). Congress’ use of “any” to modify “other
law enforcement officer” is most naturally read to mean law
enforcement officers of whatever kind.4 The word “any” is
repeated four times in the relevant portion of § 2680(c), and
two of those instances appear in the particular phrase at
issue: “any officer of customs or excise or any other law en
forcement officer.” (Emphasis added.) Congress inserted
the word “any” immediately before “other law enforcement
officer,” leaving no doubt that it modifies that phrase. To
be sure, the text’s references to “tax or customs duty” and
“officer[s] of customs or excise” indicate that Congress in
tended to preserve immunity for claims arising from an offi
cer’s enforcement of tax and customs laws. The text also
indicates, however, that Congress intended to preserve im
munity for claims arising from the detention of property, and
4 Of course, other circumstances may counteract the effect of expansive
modifiers. For example, we have construed an “any” phrase narrowly
when it included a term of art that compelled that result. See Circuit
City Stores, Inc. v. Adams, 532 U. S. 105, 115–116 (2001) (construing “any
other class of workers engaged in . . . commerce,” 9 U. S. C. § 1, narrowly
based on the Court’s previous interpretation of “in commerce” as a term
of art with a narrower meaning). We also have construed such phrases
narrowly when another term in the provision made sense only under a
narrow reading, see United States v. Alvarez-Sanchez, 511 U. S. 350, 357–
358 (1994) (limiting “any law-enforcement officer” to federal officers be
cause the statute’s reference to “delay” made sense only with respect to
federal officers), and when a broad reading would have implicated sover
eignty concerns, see Raygor v. Regents of Univ. of Minn., 534 U. S. 533,
541–542 (2002) (applying the “clear statement rule” applicable to waivers
of sovereign immunity to construe the phrase “all civil actions” to exclude
a category of claims, “even though nothing in the statute expressly ex
clude[d]” them). None of the circumstances that motivated our decisions
in these cases is present here.

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there is no indication that Congress intended immunity for
those claims to turn on the type of law being enforced.
Petitioner would require Congress to clarify its intent to
cover all law enforcement officers by adding phrases such
as “performing any official law enforcement function,” or
“without limitation.” But Congress could not have chosen
a more all-encompassing phrase than “any other law enforce
ment officer” to express that intent. We have no reason to
demand that Congress write less economically and more
repetitiously.
Recent amendments to § 2680(c) support the conclusion
that “any other law enforcement officer” is not limited to
officers acting in a customs or excise capacity. In the Civil
Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000, Congress added sub
sections (c)(1)–(c)(4) to 28 U. S. C. § 2680. § 3(a), 114 Stat.
211. As amended, § 2680(c) provides that the § 1346(b)
waiver of sovereign immunity, notwithstanding the excep
tion at issue in this case, applies to:
“[A]ny claim based on injury or loss of goods, merchan
dise, or other property, while in the possession of any
officer of customs or excise or any other law enforcement
officer, if—
“(1) the property was seized for the purpose of for
feiture under any provision of Federal law providing for
the forfeiture of property other than as a sentence im
posed upon conviction of a criminal offense;
“(2) the interest of the claimant was not forfeited;
“(3) the interest of the claimant was not remitted or
mitigated (if the property was subject to forfeiture); and
“(4) the claimant was not convicted of a crime for
which the interest of the claimant in the property was
subject to forfeiture under a Federal criminal forfeit
ure law.”
The amendment does not govern petitioner’s claim because
his property was not “seized for the purpose of forfeiture,”

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as required by paragraph (1). Nonetheless, the amendment
is relevant because our construction of “any other law en
forcement officer” must, to the extent possible, ensure that
the statutory scheme is coherent and consistent. See Rob
inson v. Shell Oil Co., 519 U. S. 337, 340 (1997) (citing United
States v. Ron Pair Enterprises, Inc., 489 U. S. 235, 240
(1989)). The amendment canceled the exception—and thus
restored the waiver of sovereign immunity—for certain sei
zures of property based on any federal forfeiture law. See
28 U. S. C. § 2680(c)(1) (excepting property claims if “the
property was seized for the purpose of forfeiture under any
provision of Federal law providing for the forfeiture of prop
erty” (emphasis added)).
Under petitioner’s interpretation, only law enforcement of
ficers enforcing customs or excise laws were immune under
the prior version of § 2680(c). Thus, on petitioner’s reading,
the amendment’s only effect was to restore the waiver for
cases in which customs or excise officers, or officers acting
in such a capacity, enforce forfeiture laws. This strikes us
as an implausible interpretation of the statute. If that were
Congress’ intent, it is not apparent why Congress would
have restored the waiver with respect to the enforcement of
all civil forfeiture laws instead of simply those related to
customs or excise. Petitioner’s interpretation makes sense
only if we assume that Congress went out of its way to re
store the waiver for cases in which customs or excise officers,
or officers acting in such a capacity, enforce forfeiture laws
unrelated to customs or excise. But petitioner fails to dem
onstrate that customs or excise officers, or officers acting in
such a capacity, ever enforce civil forfeiture laws unrelated
to customs or excise, much less that they do so with such
frequency that Congress is likely to have singled them out
in the amendment.5 It seems far more likely that Congress
5 Justice Kennedy’s dissent (hereinafter the dissent) argues that, dur
ing border searches, customs and excise officers “routinely” enforce civil

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restored the waiver for officers enforcing any civil forfeiture
law because, in its view, all such officers were covered by
the exception to the waiver prior to the amendment.
Against this textual and structural evidence that “any
other law enforcement officer” does in fact mean any other
law enforcement officer, petitioner invokes numerous canons
of statutory construction. He relies primarily on ejusdem
generis, or the principle that “when a general term follows a
specific one, the general term should be understood as a ref
erence to subjects akin to the one with specific enumera
tion.” Norfolk & Western R. Co. v. Train Dispatchers, 499
U. S. 117, 129 (1991). In petitioner’s view, “any officer of
customs or excise or any other law enforcement officer”
should be read as a three-item list, and the final, catchall
forfeiture laws unrelated to customs or excise. Post, at 239–240. But
the examples the dissent provides do not support that assertion. The
dissent maintains that a customs officer who seizes material defined as
contraband under 49 U. S. C. § 80302 et seq. is one such example. Post, at
240. But a customs officer’s authority to effect a forfeiture of such contra
band derives from a specific customs law. See 19 U. S. C. § 1595a(c)(1)(C).
Similarly, the dissent suggests that a Drug Enforcement Administration
(DEA) agent “assisting a customs official” in a border search who seizes
drug-related contraband under 21 U. S. C. § 881 is acting in a “traditional
revenue capacity.” Post, at 240. But that argument is based on the as
sumption that an officer who assists in conducting a border search acts in
a customs capacity even if he is not a customs officer and is not enforcing
a customs law. That assumption, far from self-evident, only underscores
the difficulty that would attend any attempt to define the contours of the
implied limitation on § 2680(c)’s reach proposed by petitioner and embraced
by the dissent. “Acting in a customs or excise capacity” is not a self
defining concept, and not having included such a limitation in the statute’s
language, Congress of course did not provide a definition. Finally, the
dissent points out that a customs or excise officer might effect a forfeiture
of currency or monetary instruments under 31 U. S. C. § 5317(c). Post, at
240. But § 5317(c) is hardly a civil forfeiture law unrelated to customs
or excise. See § 5317(c)(2) (2000 ed., Supp. V) (authorizing forfeiture of
property involved in a violation of, inter alia, § 5316 (2000 ed.), which
sets forth reporting requirements for exporting and importing monetary
instruments).

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phrase “any other law enforcement officer” should be limited
to officers of the same nature as the preceding specific
phrases.
Petitioner likens his case to two recent cases in which we
found the canon useful. In Washington State Dept. of So
cial and Health Servs. v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler,
537 U. S. 371, 375 (2003), we considered the clause “execu
tion, levy, attachment, garnishment, or other legal process”
in 42 U. S. C. § 407(a). Applying ejusdem generis, we con
cluded that “other legal process” was limited to legal proc
esses of the same nature as the specific items listed. 537
U. S., at 384–385. The department’s scheme for serving as
a representative payee of the benefits due to children under
its care, while a “legal process,” did not share the common
attribute of the listed items, viz., “utilization of some judicial
or quasi-judicial mechanism . . . by which control over prop
erty passes from one person to another in order to discharge”
a debt. Id., at 385. Similarly, in Dolan v. Postal Service,
546 U. S. 481 (2006), the Court considered whether an excep
tion to the FTCA’s waiver of sovereign immunity for claims
arising out of the “ ‘loss, miscarriage, or negligent transmis
sion of letters or postal matter’ ” barred a claim that mail
negligently left on the petitioner’s porch caused her to slip
and fall. Id., at 485 (quoting 28 U. S. C. § 2680(b)). Noting
that “loss” and “miscarriage” both addressed “failings in the
postal obligation to deliver mail in a timely manner to the
right address,” 546 U. S., at 487, the Court concluded that
“negligent transmission” must be similarly limited, id., at
486–489, and rejected the Government’s argument that the
exception applied to “all torts committed in the course of
mail delivery,” id., at 490.
Petitioner asserts that § 2680(c), like the clauses at issue in
Keffeler and Dolan, “ ‘presents a textbook ejusdem generis
scenario.’ ” Brief for Petitioner 15 (quoting Andrews v.
United States, 441 F. 3d 220, 224 (CA4 2006)). We disagree.

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The structure of the phrase “any officer of customs or excise
or any other law enforcement officer” does not lend itself to
application of the canon. The phrase is disjunctive, with one
specific and one general category, not—like the clauses at
issue in Keffeler and Dolan—a list of specific items sepa
rated by commas and followed by a general or collective
term. The absence of a list of specific items undercuts the
inference embodied in ejusdem generis that Congress re
mained focused on the common attribute when it used the
catchall phrase. Cf. United States v. Aguilar, 515 U. S. 593,
615 (1995) (Scalia, J., concurring in part and dissenting in
part) (rejecting the canon’s applicability to an omnibus clause
that was “one of . . . several distinct and independent prohibi
tions” rather than “a general or collective term following a
list of specific items to which a particular statutory command
is applicable”).
Moreover, it is not apparent what common attribute con
nects the specific items in § 2680(c). Were we to use the
canon to limit the meaning of “any other law enforcement
officer,” we would be required to determine the relevant lim
iting characteristic of “officer of customs or excise.” In
Jarecki v. G. D. Searle & Co., 367 U. S. 303 (1961), for exam
ple, the Court invoked noscitur a sociis in limiting the scope
of the term “ ‘discovery’ ” to the common characteristic it
shared with “ ‘exploration’ ” and “ ‘prospecting.’ ” Id., at
307. The Court noted that all three words in conjunction
“describe[d] income-producing activity in the oil and gas and
mining industries.” Ibid. Here, by contrast, no relevant
common attribute immediately appears from the phrase “of
ficer of customs or excise.” Petitioner suggests that the
common attribute is that both types of officers are charged
with enforcing the customs and excise laws. But we see no
reason why that should be the relevant characteristic as op
posed to, for example, that officers of that type are commonly
involved in the activities enumerated in the statute: the as

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sessment and collection of taxes and customs duties and the
detention of property.
Petitioner’s appeals to other interpretive principles are
also unconvincing. Petitioner contends that his reading is
supported by the canon noscitur a sociis, according to which
“ ‘a word is known by the company it keeps.’ ” S. D. Warren
Co. v. Maine Bd. of Environmental Protection, 547 U. S. 370,
378 (2006). But the cases petitioner cites in support of
applying noscitur a sociis involved statutes with stronger
contextual cues. See Gutierrez v. Ada, 528 U. S. 250, 254–
258 (2000) (applying the canon to narrow the relevant phrase,
“any election,” where it was closely surrounded by six spe
cific references to gubernatorial elections); Jarecki, supra, at
306–309 (applying the canon to narrow the term “discover
ies” to discoveries of mineral resources where it was con
tained in a list of three words, all of which applied to the oil,
gas, and mining industries and could not conceivably all
apply to any other industry). Here, although customs and
excise are mentioned twice in § 2680(c), nothing in the overall
statutory context suggests that customs and excise officers
were the exclusive focus of the provision. The emphasis in
subsection (c) on customs and excise is not inconsistent with
the conclusion that “any other law enforcement officer”
sweeps as broadly as its language suggests.
Similarly, the rule against superfluities lends petitioner
sparse support. The construction we adopt today does not
necessarily render “any officer of customs or excise” super
fluous; Congress may have simply intended to remove any
doubt that officers of customs or excise were included in “law
enforcement officer[s].” See Fort Stewart Schools v. FLRA,
495 U. S. 641, 646 (1990) (noting that “technically unneces
sary” examples may have been “inserted out of an abundance
of caution”). Moreover, petitioner’s construction threatens
to render “any other law enforcement officer” superfluous
because it is not clear when, if ever, “other law enforcement

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227 Cite as: 552 U. S. 214 (2008)
Opinion of the Court
officer[s]” act in a customs or excise capacity.6 In any event,
we do not woodenly apply limiting principles every time
Congress includes a specific example along with a general
phrase. See Harrison, 446 U. S., at 589, n. 6 (rejecting an
argument that ejusdem generis must apply when a broad
interpretation of the clause could render the specific enumer
ations unnecessary).
In the end, we are unpersuaded by petitioner’s attempt
to create ambiguity where the statute’s text and structure
suggest none. Had Congress intended to limit § 2680(c)’s
reach as petitioner contends, it easily could have written
“any other law enforcement officer acting in a customs
or excise capacity.” Instead, it used the unmodified, all
encompassing phrase “any other law enforcement officer.”
Nothing in the statutory context requires a narrowing con
struction—indeed, as we have explained, the statute is most
consistent and coherent when “any other law enforcement
6 As an example of “other law enforcement officer[s]” acting in an excise
or customs capacity, petitioner cites Formula One Motors, Ltd. v. United
States, 777 F. 2d 822, 823–824 (CA2 1985) (holding that the seizure of a
vehicle still in transit from overseas by DEA agents who searched it for
drugs was “sufficiently akin to the functions carried out by Customs offi
cials to place the agents’ conduct within the scope of section 2680(c)”).
But it is not clear that the agents in that case were acting in an excise or
customs capacity rather than in their ordinary capacity as law enforcement
agents. It seems to us that DEA agents searching a car for drugs are
acting in their capacity as officers charged with enforcing the Nation’s
drug laws, not the customs or excise laws.
Similarly, the dissent notes that 14 U. S. C. § 89(a) authorizes Coast
Guard officers to enforce customs laws. Post, at 233. But the very next
subsection of § 89 provides that Coast Guard officers effectively are cus
toms officers when they enforce customs laws. See § 89(b)(1) (providing
that Coast Guard officers “insofar as they are engaged, pursuant to the
authority contained in this section, in enforcing any law of the United
States shall . . . be deemed to be acting as agents of the particular execu
tive department . . . charged with the administration of the particular
law”). As a result, a Coast Guard officer enforcing a customs law is a
customs officer, not some “other law enforcement officer.”

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228 ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
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officer” is read to mean what it literally says. See Nor
folk & Western R. Co., 499 U. S., at 129 (noting that interpre
tive canons must yield “when the whole context dictates a
different conclusion”). It bears emphasis, moreover, that
§ 2680(c), far from maintaining sovereign immunity for the
entire universe of claims against law enforcement officers,
does so only for claims “arising in respect of ” the “detention”
of property. We are not at liberty to rewrite the statute
to reflect a meaning we deem more desirable.7 Instead,
we must give effect to the text Congress enacted: Section
2680(c) forecloses lawsuits against the United States for the
unlawful detention of property by “any,” not just “some,”
law enforcement officers.
III
For the reasons stated, the judgment of the Court of Ap
peals for the Eleventh Circuit is
Affirmed.
Justice Kennedy, with whom Justice Stevens, Jus
tice Souter, and Justice Breyer join, dissenting.
Statutory interpretation, from beginning to end, requires
respect for the text. The respect is not enhanced, however,
by decisions that foreclose consideration of the text within
the whole context of the statute as a guide to determining a
legislature’s intent. To prevent textual analysis from be
coming so rarefied that it departs from how a legislator most
likely understood the words when he or she voted for the
law, courts use certain interpretative rules to consider text
within the statutory design. These canons do not demand
7 Congress, we note, did provide an administrative remedy for lost prop
erty claimants like petitioner. Federal agencies have authority under 31
U. S. C. § 3723(a)(1) to settle certain “claim[s] for not more than $1,000 for
damage to, or loss of, privately owned property that . . . is caused by the
negligence of an officer or employee of the United States Government
acting within the scope of employment.” The BOP has settled more than
1,100 such claims in the last three years. Brief for Respondents 41, n. 17.

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Kennedy, J., dissenting
wooden reliance and are not by themselves dispositive, but
they do function as helpful guides in construing ambiguous
statutory provisions. Two of these accepted rules are ejus
dem generis and noscitur a sociis, which together instruct
that words in a series should be interpreted in relation to
one another.
Today the Court holds, if my understanding of its opinion
is correct, that there is only one possible way to read the
statute. Placing implicit reliance upon a comma at the be
ginning of a clause, the Court says that the two maxims
noted, and indeed other helpful and recognized principles of
statutory analysis, are not useful as interpretative aids in
this case because the clause cannot be understood by what
went before. In my respectful submission the Court’s ap
proach is incorrect as a general rule and as applied to the
statute now before us. Both the analytic framework and the
specific interpretation the Court now employs become bind
ing on the federal courts, which will confront other cases in
which a series of words operate in a clause similar to the one
we consider today. So this case is troubling not only for the
result the Court reaches but also for the analysis it employs.
My disagreements with the Court lead to this dissent.
I
A
The Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA or Act) allows those
who allege injury from governmental actions over a vast
sphere to seek damages for tortious conduct. The enacting
Congress enumerated 13 exceptions to the Act’s broad
waiver of sovereign immunity, all of which shield the Gov
ernment from suit in specific instances. These exceptions
must be given careful consideration in order to prevent in
terference with the governmental operations described. As
noted in Kosak v. United States, 465 U. S. 848, 853, n. 9
(1984), however, “unduly generous interpretations of the ex

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230 ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
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ceptions run the risk of defeating the central purpose of
the statute.”
As the Court states, at issue here is the extent of the ex
ception for suits arising from the detention of goods in de
fined circumstances. The relevant provision excepts from
the general waiver
“claim[s] arising in respect of the assessment or collec
tion of any tax or customs duty, or the detention of any
goods, merchandise, or other property by any officer of
customs or excise or any other law enforcement officer.”
28 U. S. C. § 2680(c).
Both on first reading and upon further, close consideration,
the plain words of the statute indicate that the exception
is concerned only with customs and taxes. The provision
begins with a clause dealing exclusively with customs and
tax duties. And the provision as a whole contains four ex
press references to customs and tax, making revenue duties
and customs and excise officers its most salient features.
Cf. Gutierrez v. Ada, 528 U. S. 250, 254–255 (2000).
This is not to suggest that the Court’s reading is wholly
impermissible or without some grammatical support. After
all, detention of goods is not stated until the outset of the
second clause and at the end of the same clause the words
“any other law enforcement officer” appear; so it can be ar
gued that the first and second clauses of the provision are so
separate that all detentions by all law enforcement officers
in whatever capacity they might act are covered. Still, this
ought not be the preferred reading; for between the begin
ning of the second clause and its closing reference to “any
other law enforcement officer” appears another reference to
“officer[s] of customs or excise,” this time in the context of
property detention. This is quite sufficient, in my view, to
continue the limited scope of the exception. At the very
least, the Court errs by adopting a rule which simply bars
all consideration of the canons of ejusdem generis and nosci

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tur a sociis. And when those canons are consulted, together
with other common principles of interpretation, the case
for limiting the exception to customs and tax more than
overcomes the position maintained by the Government and
adopted by the Court.
The ejusdem generis canon provides that, where a seem
ingly broad clause constitutes a residual phrase, it must be
controlled by, and defined with reference to, the “enumerated
categories . . . which are recited just before it,” so that the
clause encompasses only objects similar in nature. Circuit
City Stores, Inc. v. Adams, 532 U. S. 105, 115 (2001). The
words “any other law enforcement officer” immediately fol
low the statute’s reference to “officer[s] of customs or excise,”
as well as the first clause’s reference to the assessment of
tax and customs duties. 28 U. S. C. § 2680(c).
The Court counters that § 2680(c) “is disjunctive, with one
specific and one general category,” rendering ejusdem gene
ris inapplicable. Ante, at 225. The canon’s applicability,
however, is not limited to those statutes that include a laun
dry list of items. See, e. g., Norfolk & Western R. Co. v.
Train Dispatchers, 499 U. S. 117, 129 (1991) (“[W]hen a gen
eral term follows a specific one, the general term should be
understood as a reference to subjects akin to the one with
specific enumeration”). In addition, ejusdem generis is
often invoked in conjunction with the interpretative canon
noscitur a sociis, which provides that words are to be
“ ‘known by their companions.’ ” Washington State Dept. of
Social and Health Servs. v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler,
537 U. S. 371, 384 (2003) (quoting Gutierrez, supra, at 255).
The general rule is that the “meaning of a word, and, conse
quently, the intention of the legislature,” should be “ascer
tained by reference to the context, and by considering
whether the word in question and the surrounding words
are, in fact, ejusdem generis, and referable to the same
subject-matter.” Neal v. Clark, 95 U. S. 704, 709 (1878) (in
ternal quotation marks omitted).

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A proper reading of § 2680(c) thus attributes to the last
phrase (“any other law enforcement officer”) the discrete
characteristic shared by the preceding phrases (“officer[s]
of customs or excise” and “assessment or collection of any
tax or customs duty”). See also Norton v. Southern Utah
Wilderness Alliance, 542 U. S. 55, 62–63 (2004) (applying
ejusdem generis to conclude that “ ‘failure to act’ ” means
“failure to take an agency action” (emphasis in original));
Washington State Dept. of Social and Health Servs., supra,
at 384–385 (holding that the phrase “other legal process” in
42 U. S. C. § 407(a) refers only to the utilization of a judicial
or quasi-judicial mechanism, the common attribute shared by
the phrase and the statutory enumeration preceding it).
Had Congress intended otherwise, in all likelihood it would
have drafted the section to apply to “any law enforcement
officer, including officers of customs and excise,” rather than
tacking “any other law enforcement officer” on the end of
the enumerated categories as it did here.
The common attribute of officers of customs and excise and
other law enforcement officers is the performance of func
tions most often assigned to revenue officers, including, inter
alia, the enforcement of the United States’ revenue laws and
the conduct of border searches. Although officers of cus
toms and officers of excise are in most instances the only
full-time staff charged with this duty, officers of other federal
agencies and general law enforcement officers often will be
called upon to act in the traditional capacity of a revenue
officer. For example, Drug Enforcement Administration
(DEA) or Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents fre
quently assist customs officials in the execution of border
searches. See, e. g., United States v. Gurr, 471 F. 3d 144,
147–149 (CADC 2006) (FBI involved in search of financial
documents at border); United States v. Boumelhem, 339 F. 3d
414, 424 (CA6 2003) (“FBI had been cooperating with Cus
toms as a part of a joint task force”); Formula One Motors,
Ltd. v. United States, 777 F. 2d 822, 824 (CA2 1985) (DEA

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agents were performing functions traditionally carried out
by customs officials where they seized and searched an auto
mobile that had been shipped from abroad and was still in
its shipping container). Cf. United States v. Schoor, 597
F. 2d 1303, 1305–1306 (CA9 1979) (upholding constitutionality
of cooperation among federal agencies in border searches).
Similarly, 14 U. S. C. § 89(a) grants the Coast Guard plenary
authority to stop and board American vessels to inspect for
obvious customs violations. See, e. g., United States v.
Gil-Carmona, 497 F. 3d 52 (CA1 2007) (Coast Guard assisted
an Immigration and Customs Enforcement patrol aircraft in
interdicting a vessel off the coast of Puerto Rico). To the
extent they detain goods whose possession violates customs
laws, the Coast Guard officers—while not “officer[s] of cus
toms or excise,” 28 U. S. C. § 2680(c)—are without doubt en
gaging in the enforcement of the United States’ revenue
laws.
The same is true in the tax context. Under 26 U. S. C.
§ 6321, a delinquent taxpayer’s property is subject to forfeit
ure, see Glass City Bank v. United States, 326 U. S. 265
(1945), and may be seized by any federal agent assisting the
Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in executing the forfeiture,
cf. United States v. $515,060.42 in United States Currency,
152 F. 3d 491, 495 (CA6 1998) (IRS and FBI jointly seized
currency). Thus, the final phrase “any other law enforce
ment officer” has work to do and makes considerable sense
when the statute is limited in this way.
B
The Court reaches its contrary conclusion by concentrat
ing on the word “any” before the phrase “other law enforce
ment officer.” 28 U. S. C. § 2680(c). It takes this single last
phrase to extend the statute so that it covers all detentions
of property by any law enforcement officer in whatever ca
pacity he or she acts. There are fundamental problems with
this approach, in addition to the ones already mentioned.

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First, the Court’s analysis cannot be squared with the
longstanding recognition that a single word must not be read
in isolation but instead defined by reference to its statutory
context. See King v. St. Vincent’s Hospital, 502 U. S. 215,
221 (1991) (“[T]he meaning of statutory language, plain or
not, depends on context”); Dolan v. Postal Service, 546 U. S.
481, 486 (2006) (“A word in a statute may or may not extend
to the outer limits of its definitional possibilities. Interpre
tation of a word or phrase depends upon reading the whole
statutory text, considering the purpose and context of the
statute, and consulting any precedents or authorities that
inform the analysis”). This is true even of facially broad
modifiers. The word “any” can mean “different things de
pending upon the setting,” Nixon v. Missouri Municipal
League, 541 U. S. 125, 132 (2004); see also Small v. United
States, 544 U. S. 385, 388 (2005) (citing cases), and must be
limited in its application “to those objects to which the legis
lature intended to apply them,” United States v. Palmer, 3
Wheat. 610, 631 (1818).
In Gutierrez, 528 U. S., at 254–255, for example, we held
that the phrase “in any election” in the Organic Act of Guam,
48 U. S. C. § 1422, does not refer broadly to all elections but
only to the election of Guam’s Governor and Lieutenant Gov
ernor. The Court explained that the reference to “any elec
tion” is preceded by two references to gubernatorial elec
tions and followed by four more references. In the context
of such “relentless repetition,” the Court concluded that the
phrase must be “known by [its] companions.” 528 U. S., at
255. Likewise, in United States v. Alvarez-Sanchez, 511
U. S. 350, 357 (1994), the Court addressed a phrase similar to
the statutory provision we interpret today. The Court
noted that the respondent erred in “placing dispositive
weight on the broad statutory reference to ‘any’ law enforce
ment officer or agency without considering the rest of the
statute,” and consulted instead “ ‘the context in which [the

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Kennedy, J., dissenting
phrase] is used.’ ” Id., at 357, 358 (quoting Deal v. United
States, 508 U. S. 129, 132 (1993); alteration in original).
As already mentioned, the context of § 2680(c) suggests
that, in accordance with these precedents, the statutory pro
vision should be interpreted narrowly to apply only to cus
toms and revenue duties. Its first clause deals exclusively
with customs and tax duties and, between the first and sec
ond clauses, it refers two more times to customs and tax.
See Gutierrez, supra, at 254–255; A-Mark, Inc. v. United
States Secret Serv. Dept. of Treasury, 593 F. 2d 849, 851 (CA9
1978) (Tang, J., concurring) (“The clauses both dwell exclu
sively on customs and taxes, except for the final reference to
other law-enforcement officers”).
Further, § 2680(c) provides that there will be immunity
only where there has been a “detention” of goods, merchan
dise, or property. “[D]etention” is defined by legal and non
legal dictionaries alike as a “compulsory,” “forced,” or “puni
tive” containment. Black’s Law Dictionary 459 (7th ed.
1999) (compulsory); American Heritage Dictionary 494 (4th
ed. 2000) (forced or punitive). The issue whether petition
er’s property was “detained” within the meaning of the stat
ute was not raised in this case; and so the Court leaves for
another day the exception’s applicability to these facts. See
ante, at 218, n. 2. It is important, however, to bear in mind
that, in the context of detention of goods by customs and tax
agents, it will be the rare case when property is voluntarily
turned over, rather than forcibly appropriated; indeed, cus
toms and tax agents are in the regular business of seizing
and forfeiting property, as are law enforcement agents acting
in the capacity of revenue enforcement. See Dept. of Home
land Security, U. S. Customs and Border Protection and U. S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Mid-Year FY2007—
Top IPR Commodities Seized (May 2007), online at http://www.
cbp.gov/linkhandler/cgov/import/commercial_enforcement/ipr/
seizure/07_midyr_seizures.ctt/07_midyr_seizures.pdf (all In
ternet materials as visited Jan. 10, 2008, and available in

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236 ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
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Clerk of Court’s case file) (by midyear 2007, customs officials
had executed 7,245 commodity seizures, worth a total of
$110,198,350); GAO, Border Security: Despite Progress,
Weaknesses in Traveler Inspections Exist at Our Nation’s
Ports of Entry 17 (GAO–08–219, Nov. 2007), online at http://
www.gao.gov/new.items/d08219.pdf (“According to [U. S. Cus
toms and Border Protection (CBP)], in fiscal year 2006, CBP
officers . . . seized more than 644,000 pounds of illegal drugs,
intercepted nearly 1.7 million prohibited agricultural items,
and seized over $155 million in illegal commercial merchan
dise, such as counterfeit footwear and handbags” (footnote
omitted)).
In other contexts, however, the word “detention” may or
may not accurately describe the nature of the Government
action. A prisoner’s voluntary decision to deliver property
for transfer to another facility, for example, bears a greater
similarity to a “bailment”—the delivery of personal property
after being held by the prison in trust, see American Heri
tage Dictionary, supra, at 134—than to a “detention.”
Not a single federal statute mentions the Federal Bureau
of Prisons (BOP) in the context of property detention. On
the other hand, the majority of the nine federal statutes
other than § 2680(c) containing a reference to the detention
of goods, merchandise, or other property are specific to cus
toms and excise. Compare 19 U. S. C. § 1499(a) (authorizing
customs agents to examine and detain imported merchan
dise); § 1595a(c)(3) (authorizing customs officials to detain
merchandise introduced contrary to law); 26 U. S. C. § 5311
(authorizing internal revenue officers to detain containers
containing distilled spirits, wines, or beer where there is rea
son to believe applicable taxes have not been paid); 50
U. S. C. App. § 2411(a)(2)(A) (authorizing customs officials to
seize and detain goods at ports of entry in the enforcement
of war and national defense); 22 U. S. C. § 464 (authorizing
customs agents to detain armed vessels and any property

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found thereon), with 18 U. S. C. § 981(e) (“ . . . The Attorney
General, the Secretary of the Treasury, or the Postal Service,
as the case may be, shall ensure the equitable transfer pursu
ant to paragraph (2) of any forfeited property to the appro
priate State or local law enforcement agency . . . . The
United States shall not be liable in any action arising out of
the seizure, detention, and transfer of seized property to
State or local officials”); 28 U. S. C. § 524(c)(1) (2000 ed. and
Supp. V) (appropriating a special fund for the purpose of
property detention under any law enforced or administered
by the Department of Justice); 31 U. S. C. § 9703(a)(1)(A) (es
tablishing a Department of Treasury Forfeiture Fund to pay
the expenses of property detention); 16 U. S. C. §§ 1540(e)(3),
3375(b) (authorizing the detention of goods and packages for
inspection where there is reason to believe there has been a
violation of laws governing fish, wildlife, and plants).
This would seem to indicate that Congress contemplated
that the statutory provision considered here would apply
only in those narrow circumstances where the officer is in
the regular business of forfeiting property, namely, revenue
enforcement. At the very least, it demonstrates that “de
tention” will be a difficult concept to apply case by case
under the majority’s interpretation of the statute—a prob
lem alleviated by limiting the statute to customs and tax.
Second, the Court’s construction of the phrase “any other
law enforcement officer” runs contrary to “ ‘our duty “to give
effect, if possible, to every clause and word of a statute.” ’ ”
Duncan v. Walker, 533 U. S. 167, 174 (2001) (quoting United
States v. Menasche, 348 U. S. 528, 538–539 (1955)). The
Court’s reading renders “officer[s] of customs or excise” mere
surplusage, as there would have been no need for Congress
to have specified that officers of customs and officers of ex
cise were immune if they indeed were subsumed within the
allegedly all-encompassing “any” officer clause. See Circuit
City Stores, 532 U. S., at 114.

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Third, though the final reference to “any other law en
forcement officer” does result in some ambiguity, the legisla
tive history, by virtue of its exclusive reference to customs
and excise, confirms that Congress did not shift its attention
from the context of revenue enforcement when it used these
words at the end of the statute. See, e. g., S. Rep. No. 1400,
79th Cong., 2d Sess., 33 (1946) (in discussing 28 U. S. C.
§ 2680(c) referring only to “the detention of goods by customs
officers”); A. Holtzoff, Report on Proposed Federal Tort
Claims Bill 16 (1931) (noting that the property-detention ex
ception was added to the legislation to “include immunity
from liability in respect of loss in connection with the deten
tion of goods or merchandise by any officer of customs or
excise”).
Indeed, the Court’s construction reads the exception to de
feat the central purpose of the statute, an interpretative dan
ger the Court has warned against in explicit terms. See
Kosak, 465 U. S., at 854, n. 9 (the Court must identify only
“ ‘those circumstances which are within the words and rea
son of the exception’—no less and no more” (quoting
Dalehite v. United States, 346 U. S. 15, 31 (1953))). It is dif
ficult to conceive that the FTCA, which was enacted by Con
gress to make the tort liability of the United States “the
same as that of a private person under like circumstance[s],”
S. Rep. No. 1400, at 32, would allow any officer under any
circumstance to detain property without being accountable
under the Act to those injured by his or her tortious conduct.
If Congress wanted to say that all law enforcement officers
may detain property without liability in tort, including when
they perform general law enforcement tasks, it would have
done so in more express terms; one would expect at least a
reference to law enforcement officers outside the customs or
excise context either in the text of the statute or in the legis
lative history. In the absence of that reference, the Court
ought not presume that the liberties of the person who owns
the property would be so lightly dismissed and disregarded.

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II
A
The 2000 amendments do not require a contrary conclusion.
The Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 (CAFRA), as
applicable here, limits the operation of § 2680(c)’s exception.
See § 3(a), 114 Stat. 211. The limitation (i. e., the exception
to the exception) applies where there has been an injury or
loss of goods and “the property was seized for the purpose of
forfeiture under any provision of Federal law.” 28 U. S. C.
§ 2680(c)(1). In my view the amendment establishes that of
ficers of customs and excise, and law enforcement officials
performing functions traditionally reserved for revenue offi
cers, shall be liable in tort for damage to the property when
the owner’s interest in the goods in the end is not forfeited
(and when other conditions apply). And this is so regard
less of whether the officer acted under the revenue laws of
the United States or, alternatively, another civil or criminal
forfeiture provision.
The majority’s reading of CAFRA for a contrary proposi
tion is premised on the assumption that there is no circum
stance in which a customs or excise officer, or an officer act
ing in such a capacity, would “enforce [civil] forfeiture laws
unrelated to customs or excise.” Ante, at 222. But cus
toms and tax officials, along with law enforcement officers
performing customs and tax duties, routinely do just that.
See, e. g., Customs and Border Protection, Seizures and
Penalties Links, http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/toolbox/legal/
authority_enforce/seizures_penalties.xml (CBP has “full au
thority to . . . seize merchandise for violation of CBP laws or
those of other federal agencies that are enforced by CBP”).
Indeed, the customs laws expressly contemplate forfeitures
and seizures of property under nonrevenue provisions. See,
e. g., 19 U. S. C. § 1600 (“The procedures [governing seizures
of property] set forth in [§§ 1602–1619] shall apply to seizures
of any property effected by customs officers under any law

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240 ALI v. FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
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enforced or administered by the Customs Service unless such
law specifies different procedures”).
By way of example, a customs or excise official might effect
a civil forfeiture of currency or monetary instruments under
the Bank Secrecy Act, 31 U. S. C. § 5317(c) (2000 ed., Supp.
V); or of counterfeit instruments, illegal music recordings, or
firearms under the Contraband Act, 49 U. S. C. § 80302 et seq.
(2000 ed. and Supp. IV). Similarly, a DEA agent assisting
a customs official in a border search (and thus acting in a
customs capacity) might effect a civil forfeiture of vehicles
or goods associated with the drug trade under federal drug
laws. See 21 U. S. C. § 881 (2000 ed. and Supp. V); see also,
e. g., Formula One Motors, 777 F. 2d, at 822–823. Though
acting pursuant to a civil forfeiture law that is not specific
to customs and taxes, the DEA agent would be covered by
§ 2680(c)’s exception to the exception because he or she would
be acting in a traditional revenue capacity—that of conduct
ing a routine search of persons and effects of persons cross
ing an international boundary.
The Court counters that the Bank Secrecy Act, 31 U. S. C.
§ 5317(c), is not “unrelated to customs or excise” because it
cross-references a requirement for exporting and importing
monetary instruments, § 5316. See ante, at 223, n. 5. But
§ 5316, despite being “[r]elated” to customs duties, is part of
the federal Currency and Foreign Transactions Reporting
Act, see § 5311 et seq. (2000 ed. and Supp. IV), not the United
States’ customs laws.
The Court also notes that customs agents have the author
ity to seize contraband under the customs laws, particularly
19 U. S. C. § 1595a(c)(1). I do not dispute that customs
agents often act under customs laws when seizing property.
My point, which goes unrefuted by the Court, is that it was
reasonable for Congress to have specified that customs and
excise officers would be covered by the exception to the ex
ception even when acting pursuant to federal laws more gen
erally. For instance, § 1595a(c)(1) applies only where “[m]er

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chandise . . . is introduced . . . into the United States contrary
to law,” which appears to target the importation of property
subject to duty or entry restrictions. Title 28 U. S. C.
§ 2680(c), by contrast, was amended in 2000 to encompass not
only the detention of “goods or merchandise” but the deten
tion of all “property.” § 3(a), 114 Stat. 211. In circum
stances not involving imported “merchandise,” then, the cus
toms official would be acting pursuant to law enforcement
authority derived not from the customs laws but, inter alia,
the Contraband and Bank Secrecy Acts. The same is true
of noncustoms officers acting in a customs capacity.
At the very least this renders the Court’s reliance on the
views of a subsequent Congress suspect. We have said
“subsequent acts can shape or focus” the meaning of a stat
ute. FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U. S.
120, 143 (2000). There is no indication, however, that by
adding a forfeiture exception to the exception, Congress
intended to broaden the scope of the original immunity.
Cf. SEC v. Capital Gains Research Bureau, Inc., 375 U. S.
180, 199–200 (1963).
B
Though the Court does not much rely on the point, perhaps
it has concerns respecting suits like the one now before us.
Petitioner sues for lost property valued at about $177. Law
enforcement officers in the federal prison system must take
inventory of the property they store, and with just under
200,000 persons in the federal prison population, see Federal
Bureau of Prisons, Weekly Population Report, online
at http://www.bop.gov/news/weekly_report.jsp (reporting
199,342 federal inmates as of January 7, 2008), the burden on
the Government to account for missing items of little value
could be a substantial one.
There are sound reasons, though, for rejecting this con
cern in interpreting the statute. To begin with, as already
discussed, if it were a congressional objective to give a com
prehensive exception to all officers who detain property,

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Congress most likely would have written a specific provision
to address the point, quite apart from the special concerns it
had with customs and revenue. The exception as the Court
now interprets it extends not only to trivial detentions, not
only to prison officials, not only to those in custody, but to
all detentions of property of whatever value held by all law
enforcement officials, a reading that simply does not comport
with the plain text and context of the statute.
Second, as the Court observed when interpreting another
exception that raised the concern of numerous frivolous
claims, liability for negligent transmission “is a risk shared
by any business [involved in management of detention facili
ties],” including the Government. Dolan, 546 U. S., at 491.
Third, there are already in place administrative proce
dures that must be exhausted before the suit is allowed, di
minishing the number of frivolous suits that would be heard
in federal court. See 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(a) (“No action shall
be brought with respect to prison conditions under section
1983 of this title, or any other Federal law, by a prisoner
confined in any jail, prison, or other correctional facility
until such administrative remedies as are available are ex
hausted”). Under 28 CFR § 543.31(a) (2007), the “owner of
the damaged or lost property” first must file an FTCA claim
with the BOP regional office; the BOP, in turn, is authorized
by statute to settle administrative claims for not more than
$1,000, see 31 U. S. C. § 3723(a), which likely encompasses
most claims brought by federal prisoners. Only if the pris
oner is “dissatisfied with the final agency action” may he or
she file suit in an “appropriate U. S. District Court.” 28
CFR § 543.32(g).
* * *
If Congress had intended to give sweeping immunity to all
federal law enforcement officials from liability for the deten
tion of property, it would not have dropped this phrase onto
the end of the statutory clause so as to appear there as some
thing of an afterthought. The seizure of property by an of

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ficer raises serious concerns for the liberty of our people and
the Act should not be read to permit appropriation of prop
erty without a remedy in tort by language so obscure and
indirect.
For these reasons, in my view, the judgment of the Court
of Appeals ought to be reversed.
Justice Breyer, with whom Justice Stevens joins,
dissenting.
I agree with Justice Kennedy that context makes clear
that Congress intended the phrase “any other law enforce
ment officer” to apply only to officers carrying out customs
or excise duties. See 28 U. S. C. § 2680(c). But I write sep
arately to emphasize, as Justice Kennedy’s dissent itself
makes clear, that the relevant context extends well beyond
Latin canons and other such purely textual devices.
As with many questions of statutory interpretation, the
issue here is not the meaning of the words. The dictionary
meaning of each word is well known. Rather, the issue is
the statute’s scope. What boundaries did Congress intend
to set? To what circumstances did Congress intend the
phrase, as used in this statutory provision, to apply? The
majority answers this question by referring to an amend
ment that creates an exception for certain forfeitures and by
emphasizing the statutory word “any.” As to the amend
ment, I find Justice Kennedy’s counterargument convinc
ing. See ante, at 239–241 (dissenting opinion). And, in my
view, the word “any” provides no help whatsoever.
The word “any” is of no help because all speakers (includ
ing writers and legislators) who use general words such as
“all,” “any,” “never,” and “none” normally rely upon context
to indicate the limits of time and place within which they
intend those words to do their linguistic work. And with
the possible exception of the assertion of a universal truth,
say, by a mathematician, scientist, philosopher, or theologian,
such limits almost always exist. When I call out to my wife,

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“There isn’t any butter,” I do not mean, “There isn’t any
butter in town.” The context makes clear to her that I am
talking about the contents of our refrigerator. That is to
say, it is context, not a dictionary, that sets the boundaries
of time, place, and circumstance within which words such as
“any” will apply. See United States v. Palmer, 3 Wheat.
610, 631 (1818) (Marshall, C. J.) (“[G]eneral words,” such as
the word “ ‘any’,” must “be limited” in their application “to
those objects to which the legislature intended to apply
them”); Small v. United States, 544 U. S. 385, 388 (2005)
(“The word ‘any’ considered alone cannot answer” the ques
tion “whether the statutory reference ‘convicted in any
court’ includes a conviction entered in a foreign court”);
Nixon v. Missouri Municipal League, 541 U. S. 125, 132
(2004) (“ ‘[A]ny’ ” means “different things depending upon the
setting”); United States v. Alvarez-Sanchez, 511 U. S. 350,
357 (1994) (“[R]espondent errs in placing dispositive weight
on the broad statutory reference to ‘any’ law enforce
ment officer or agency without considering the rest of the
statute”).
Context, of course, includes the words immediately sur
rounding the phrase in question. And canons such as ejus
dem generis and noscitur a sociis offer help in evaluating
the significance of those surrounding words. Yet that help
is limited. That is because other contextual features can
show that Congress intended a phrase to apply more broadly
than the immediately surrounding words by themselves sug
gest. See Circuit City Stores, Inc. v. Adams, 532 U. S. 105,
138–140 (2001) (Souter, J., dissenting) (finding “good rea
sons” not to apply ejusdem generis because the statute’s his
tory and purposes make clear that the words “any other class
of workers” in the phrase “seamen, railroad employees, or
any other class of workers” refer, not just to other transpor
tation workers, but to workers of all kinds including retail
store clerks). It is because canons of construction are not
“conclusive” and “are often countered . . . by some maxim

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pointing in a different direction.” Id., at 115 (majority opin
ion). And it is because these particular canons simply crys
tallize what English speakers already know, namely, that
lists often (but not always) group together items with similar
characteristics. That is why we cannot, without comic ef
fect, yoke radically different nouns to a single verb, e. g., “He
caught three salmon, two trout, and a cold.”
In this case, not only the immediately surrounding words
but also every other contextual feature supports Justice
Kennedy’s conclusion. The textual context includes the
location of the phrase within a provision that otherwise ex
clusively concerns customs and revenue duties. And the
nontextual context includes several features that, taken
together, indicate that Congress intended a narrow tort
liability exception related to customs and excise.
First, drafting history shows that the relevant portion of
the bill that became the Federal Tort Claims Act concerned
only customs and excise. Initially, the relevant provision of
the bill exempted only claims “arising in respect of the as
sessment or collection of any tax or customs duty.” See,
e. g., S. 4377, 71st Cong., 2d Sess., 4 (1930). In 1931,
a Special Assistant to the Attorney General, Alexander
Holtzoff, wrote additional draft language, namely, “or the de
tention of any goods or merchandise by any officer of customs
or excise or any other law enforcement officer.” Bill Draft,
p. 2, reprinted in Report on Proposed Federal Tort Claims
Bill p. 2 (1931) (emphasis added). Holtzoff, in a report to
a congressional agency, said that the expanded language
sought “to include immunity from liability in respect of loss
in connection with the detention of goods or merchandise
by any officer of customs or excise.” Id., at 16. Holtzoff
explained that the language was suggested by a similar Brit
ish bill that mentioned only customs and excise officials.
Ibid. (referring to the bill proposed in the Crown Proceed
ings Committee Report § 11(5)(c), pp. 17–18 (Apr. 1927) (Cmd.
2842) (“No proceedings shall lie under this section . . . for

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or in respect of the loss of or any deterioration or damage
occasioned to, or any delay in the release of, any goods or
merchandise by reason of anything done or omitted to be
done by any officer of customs and excise acting as such”));
see Kosak v. United States, 465 U. S. 848, 857, n. 13 (1984)
(While “the ideas expressed [in Holtzoff ’s report] should not
be given great weight in determining the intent of the Legis
lature,” at least in some circumstances, “it seems to us sense
less to ignore entirely the views of [the provision’s] drafts
man”). And Members of Congress repeatedly referred to
the exception as encompassing claims involving customs and
excise functions. See, e. g., H. R. Rep. No. 2428, 76th Cong.,
3d Sess., 5 (1940); S. Rep. No. 1196, 77th Cong., 2d Sess.,
7 (1942); H. R. Rep. No. 2245, 77th Cong., 2d Sess., 10 (1942);
H. R. Rep. No. 1287, 79th Cong., 1st Sess., 6 (1945); S. Rep.
No. 1400, 79th Cong., 2d Sess., 33 (1946).
Second, insofar as Congress sought, through the Act’s ex
ceptions, to preclude tort suits against the Government
where “adequate remedies were already available,” Kosak,
supra, at 858; see S. Rep. No. 1400, at 33; H. R. Rep. No. 1287,
at 6 (setting forth that purpose), a limited exception makes
sense; a broad exception does not. Other statutes already
provided recovery for plaintiffs harmed by federal officers
enforcing customs and tax laws but not for plaintiffs harmed
by all other federal officers enforcing most other laws. See
Bazuaye v. United States, 83 F. 3d 482, 485–486 (CADC 1996)
(detailing history).
Third, the practical difference between a limited and a
broad interpretation is considerable, magnifying the impor
tance of the congressional silence to which Justice Ken
nedy points, see ante, at 238. A limited interpretation of
the phrase “any other law enforcement officer” would likely
encompass only those law enforcement officers working, say,
at borders and helping to enforce customs and excise laws.
The majority instead interprets this provision to include the
tens of thousands of officers performing unrelated tasks.

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The Justice Department estimates that there are more than
100,000 law enforcement officers, not including members of
the armed services. See, e. g., Dept. of Justice, Bureau of
Justice Statistics Bulletin, B. Reaves, Federal Law Enforce
ment Officers, 2004, p. 1 (July 2006). And although the law’s
history contains much that indicates the provision’s scope is
limited to customs and excise, it contains nothing at all sug
gesting an intent to apply the provision more broadly, in
deed, to multiply the number of officers to whom it applies
by what is likely one or more orders of magnitude. It is
thus not the Latin canons, ejusdem generis and noscitur a
sociis, that shed light on the application of the statutory
phrase but Justice Scalia’s more pertinent and easily re
membered English-language observation that Congress
“does not . . . hide elephants in mouseholes.” Whitman v.
American Trucking Assns., Inc., 531 U. S. 457, 468 (2001).
For these reasons, I dissent and I join Justice Ken
nedy’s dissent.