1. This case presents an important issue regarding the meaning and application of the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution. This Court has held that just compensation must be paid whenever private property is used for public purposes.

2. The Takings Clause mandates that "just compensation" be paid to the owners of private property whenever their property is put to public use. Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid, 141 S. Ct. 2063, 2074 (2021); Murr v. Wisconsin, 582 U.S. 383, 392 (2017); Webb's Fabulous Pharmacies, Inc. v. Beckwith, 449 U.S. 155, 164 (1980). Just compensation is required whether the public use of private property is permanent or merely temporary. The "duration of an appropriation—just like the size of an appropriation, see Loretto [v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U.S. 419,] 436-37 [(1982]—bears only on the amount of compensation" that is owed to the property owner. Cedar Point Nursery, 141 S. Ct. at 2074 (emphasis added) (citing United States v. Dow, 357 U.S. 17, 26 (1958)). A taking occurs as soon as the property is used by the State for public purposes without paying for it. See Knick v. Twp. of Scott, Pennsylvania, 139 S. Ct. 2162, 2170 (2019) (Takings Clause is violated "as soon as a government takes [private] property for public use without paying for it").

3. The California Unclaimed Property Law prohibits the payment of any additional compensation when unclaimed property is returned to its owners. Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 1540(c). Despite this Court's precedent, the Ninth Circuit held that owners of unclaimed private property, which is held by the Controller and used for public purposes until reclaimed, are not entitled to recover any just compensation for the public use of their property. Misapplying two inapplicable Ninth Circuit decisions, Turnacliff v. Westly, 546 F.3d 1113 (9th Cir. 2008), and Suever v. Connell, 579 F.3d 1047 (9th Cir. 2009), the Ninth Circuit held that unclaimed property owners are not owed just compensation for the taking of their private property. Both cases involved a different statutory regime than the one at issue in this case. That version of California's Unclaimed Property Law allowed the Controller to pay interest to the owners of unclaimed property. The narrow issue in Turnacliff was whether the Controller correctly computed the amount of interest owed on unclaimed property that had been returned to its owner. 546 F.3d at 1115. The issues in Swever were whether the plaintiffs received sufficient notice of their unclaimed property, whether the Controller mishandled their property while it was held by the State, and (like the issue in Turnacliff), whether the State's miscalculation of interest under the prior version of the UPL and was itself another taking. 579 F.3d at 1050-51. The Ninth Circuit's failure to follow this Court's precedent and its misapplication of the inapplicable decisions in Turnacliff an

Whether the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment requires states to pay just compensation to owners of unclaimed property held and used for public purposes