18 U.S.C. § 494
Section 494 · Contractors bonds, bids, and public records
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 26 court decisions — leading case United States v. Calabro (1972)
Most recently applied in 972 F. Supp. 2d 947 - Lowe v. Viewpoint Bank (September 2013)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Whoever falsely makes, alters, forges, or counterfeits any bond, bid, proposal, contract, guarantee, security, official bond, public record, affidavit, or other writing for the purpose of defrauding the United States; or
Whoever utters or publishes as true or possesses with intent to utter or publish as true, any such false, forged, altered, or counterfeited writing, knowing the same to be false, forged, altered, or counterfeited; or
Whoever transmits to, or presents at any office or to any officer of the United States, any such false, forged, altered, or counterfeited writing, knowing the same to be false, forged, altered, or counterfeited—
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Historical and Revision Notes
Based on title 18, U.S.C., 1940 ed., §72 (Mar. 4, 1909, ch. 321, §28, 35 Stat. 1094).
Reference to persons causing, procuring, aiding or assisting was omitted as unnecessary as such persons are made principals by section 2 of this title.
Changes were also made in phraseology.
Amendments
1994—Pub. L. 103–322 substituted “fined under this title” for “fined not more than $1,000”.
Canal Zone
Applicability of section to Canal Zone, see section 14 of this title.