Cops still take more stuff from people than burglars do (2021)

https://thewhyaxis.substack.com/p/cops-still-take-more-stuff-from-people

by wahnfrieden • 3 years ago

480 267 3 years ago

thewhyaxis.substack.com

taeric4• 3 years ago

I can hope that the numbers "seized" don't include things that are returned after verification of ownership or any other exonerating circumstances. Is that tracked?

That is, this is much less concerning if the numbers are such that 90%, say, is proven illicit.

wahnfrieden9• 3 years ago

Well the $100k story was determined to not have any evidence/proof beyond police suspicion (you can find more details that were released after this was written - the cops didn't like that her eyes darted once during questioning, that she said the luggage was gray not black, the cops said they smelled weed even though there was none found, etc - that was sufficient justification to seize the cash and close the case without filing any charges) and the money was not returned

To get the money back, it must be fought in court. Legal fees are not returned if the case is won, and if lost, you must cover the defense fees. In Illinois the median forfeiture was about $1k, with many <$100 forfeitures clustered in the poorest neighborhoods, while lawyer fees are ~$3k for state/local police cases. Federal seizures are much more expensive to fight.

There's no process where the police further verify the provenance of the cash they seize and return it without it being fought for in court. It's taken and they celebrate it and move on. So as with most police oversight, the numbers you're asking for don't exist.

taeric4• 3 years ago

That is infuriating, to say the least. :(

hgsgm3• 3 years ago

The number also includes funds that were seized after criminal conviction.

taeric4• 3 years ago

Do you have a breakdown that distinguishes that?

rightbyte2• 3 years ago

Houses too? In that case the numbers don't say much.

strathmeyer• 3 years ago

When I was arrested the cop took the money out of my wallet and asked if I knew he could just take it, he didn't seem to concerned about "verification of ownership or any other exonerating circumstances" such as I just took the money out of an ATM. You have to wonder what fantasy world you people are living in.

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

Basically, you must prove a negative: that you did not commit a crime. It’s a complete inversion of the “innocent until proven guilty” philosophy driving most of the criminal justice system.

That's because it's civil forfeiture. There is no presumption of innocence in civil law; it's part of criminal law.

Arrath• 3 years ago

A huge part of why I think civil forfeiture as a practice should go away entirely. Due to the burden of proof being set on the party that just had their resources seized[1], it often amounts to state sponsored robbery.

[1]And whom, even if they still had those resources, quite often wouldn't be able to afford the costs associated with proving themselves innocent to get their stuff back in the first place.

E: Oh that's how you do italics on HN.

hgsgm3• 3 years ago

And the seized property isn't even frozen, destroyed, or donated; it is kept for profit.

eyelidlessness• 3 years ago

While this is an accurate assessment of its legality, it’s not a particularly helpful response to the philosophy. And whether intended or not, it has the effect of implying the distinction may justify the practice.

From my perspective, “cops can take your stuff unless you prove your innocence because it’s not a criminal proceeding” is a distinction without a difference. Cops shouldn’t be able to just take your stuff.

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

I don't argue with that! I just explained how it was possible to implement it in law in the first place. But yes, it absolutely must have been a criminal procedure, as it is in some (many?) other countries.

abigail953• 3 years ago

It's not an accurate assesssment of its legality.

The government has to prove suspicion of wrongdoing on a preponderence of the evidence.

Edit:

You can show up to a civil forfeiture case as a claimant, refuse to answer other questions under the 5A, and walk out with the goods if the judge doesn't think there's any wrongdoing.

bigbacaloa• 3 years ago

How can the state taking something be considered civil?

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

Because "civil" means "having to do with people and government office as opposed to the military or religion" /s

Next time on the program: why "assault" in "battery and assault" doesn't actually mean the same as "assault" in colloquial speech.

marcus0x622• 3 years ago

Because the action is against the property being seized, not the owner of said property[0]. Property cannot commit a crime, and therefore cannot be the defendant in a criminal proceeding, but at the federal level and in almost every state, there are civil statutes permitting these cases to be litigated by the government in rem.[1]

0 - note that if this happens to your property, it sure will feel like it is happening to you. Lawyers will be happy to lawsplain their BS theory[2] to you for a nominal hourly fee. This will not make you feel any better for having been robbed at gunpoint.

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_rem_jurisdiction

2 - Spoiler alert: the theory is exactly as stupid as it sounds.

NoMoreNicksLeft2• 3 years ago

Indirectly, because the idea behind it is old and pertains to very peculiar circumstances.

Imagine that it's 1804, and a ship shows up in port carrying contraband. The sailors on the ship didn't know about it, they just make sure the boat doesn't sink. The owners are nowhere to be found, they live in London or Paris or Antwerp or something, and you'll never be able to arrest them for it (this is the pre-extradition world).

What do you do with the contraband? You need a formal law to deal with seizing it. And this serves as the framework for our modern civil forfeiture laws. A case would be entered into the dockets something like "State of New York vs. 152 Gallons of Whisky" or whatever. The whisky itself committed no crime, there can't be a criminal case.

pierrebai• 3 years ago

Calling it civil forfeiture is in itself problematic. The assumption is that the person committed a crime and profited from it. Kinda of a weird mix. You must prove you did not commit a crime in a civil case.

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

It actually sounds unconstitutional when you put it like that... but then again, if you don't put it like that then it doesn't! Law is like an ass, isn't it, it goes in whatever direction the drover points it.

rtkwe• 3 years ago

The original use case of CAF as a way to seize assets of unknown or absentee owners with clear connections to crimes makes it make more sense both legally and philosophically. IMO the big fix for civil asset forfeiture is that if there is a claimant you need to charge them with some crime to seize it and it has to go through the normal process.

bandyaboot2• 3 years ago

First off all…mind blown. I had no idea the presumption of innocence didn’t apply to civil law. Second, is slapping a “civil” label on there all you have to do to make it reasonable? “But judge, you can’t put me in jail. When I took that guy’s wallet at gunpoint, I made sure to inform him that it was civil-armed-robbery.”

Edit: rhetorical question as I don’t think you’re actually of the opinion that it’s reasonable.

dfxm122• 3 years ago

As a legal idea, civil forfeiture is something the state specifically empowers police to do. This is on top of cops pretty much being able to do what they want without recourse. Normal civilians don't have this luxury.

afiori2• 3 years ago

IIUC in US constitutional terms the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" is actually "innocent until something (eg a trial) pronounces you guilty".

The difference being that who needs to prove what can be quite flexible.

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

Imagine you arrange some "send goods, receive payment later" kind of deal with someone; you send them the goods but they never pay you. So you bring them to court... and now you have to prove that they did not pay you. While they claim they did and even gave you a signed receipt which you must have thrown away.

So naturally, because in most civil cases its the other party's inaction that's supposed to be punished, courts adopt "guilty until proven otherwise" stance. Now it's the other party that has to show a receipt signed by you, or to show their bank statement that says they've transfered money to you, etc. That's one reason why there is so much paper trail in business and commerce — so that's when someone sues you, you could use all that paper to cover your ass.

NoMoreNicksLeft2• 3 years ago

It's worse than that.

You have to prove the cash did not commit a crime. This sounds absurd, but it's easily prove, the cases are named things like United States vs. $117,000 in Cash and State of Missouri vs. Gold Jewelry Worth Approximately $1400.

But if that's not absurd enough for you, boy do I have some good news for you! Since the case is against the property, you the previous owner of that property don't automatically have standing. Court cases in the US are based on common law (except maybe Louisiana, who knows what goes on in that Bonapartist shithole), to appear in court at trial, you have to prove that you're actually a party to the case. It's automatic if you're the defendant in a criminal trial (or plaintiff in civil), or the prosecutor... but third parties are usually told to pound sand. And the case clearly names the property as the defendant.

Don't let me overstate it... as far as I know, no one's ever been denied standing when petitioning this, but it's another hoop to jump through. One that will cost you money.

If they seized less than $10,000 or so, forget it. It'll cost you that to get the stuff back. So they tend to target lesser amounts now days, knowing that no one will bother. And if it's a higher amount, they'll often try to settle... "hey we know it will cost you another $5000, so why don't you take half and we keep the rest?" Of course, you're still paying the lawyer a few grand to get that far, and it will come out of your $5000, and not their (using that word pains me) half.

If you haven't retched in your own mouth a little, then I still haven't properly explained how bad this is. Go read.

mulmen16• 3 years ago

If I shout “this is a civil matter!” while stabbing you in the chest can I dodge the murder charge?

Joker_vD8• 3 years ago

If you possess legislative powers (which no single person actually does) then sure, you can decriminalize murder and make it a non-criminal offence.

But why? You lose your presumption of innocence, you lose a guaranteed defence attorney, and you still face years of prison and maybe even the chair... there is a reason why offences with gravest punishments (that is, crimes) have pretty strict procedures and proof requirements set up around them.

monocasa• 3 years ago

And yet, so many times you ask cops to help with a crime they say "oh, that's a civil matter, we can't do anything".

ortusdux2• 3 years ago

And employers take more than both combined.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_theft

cma• 3 years ago

I can imagine employers + landlords is a pretty big cut off the top.

dbingham2• 3 years ago

Yep. If you are a retail worker and your boss withholds $20 from your paycheck, it's not considered criminal theft. It's a civil matter. You have no recourse except civil law. In many states, you have to file a complaint with the Attorney General's office which may or may not do anything about it.

If you decide to simply take $20 out of the till to pay yourself - that's criminal theft. You get arrested, go to jail, and have to fight criminal charges.

It's one of the more blatant examples of how the laws of the United States are written to unjustly empower those with wealth that I am aware of.

sneed_chucker2• 3 years ago

It's one of the more blatant examples of how the laws of the United States are written to unjustly empower those with wealth that I am aware of.

The most blatant thing for me will always be the tax code.

Alone way that W2 income vs long term capital gains is taxed (not to mention that losses are fully tax deductible) makes the message very clear.

hammock2• 3 years ago

Yep. If you are a retail worker and your boss withholds $20 from your paycheck, it's not considered criminal theft. It's a civil matter. You have no recourse except civil law.

If a contractor takes your down payment and then never installs the toilet is that criminal theft?

If a contractor installs your toilet without advance payment and then you never pay her, is that criminal theft?

htss2013• 3 years ago

Not necessarily. It defaults to a civil matter, but if a DA thinks that the employer knowingly defrauded employees, they could prosecute them criminally. It's pure prosecutorial discretion. But prosexutors have limited resources and don't want to get tied down with business disputes. It's not true that the law itself mandates this to only be in civil court.

toolz6• 3 years ago

What do you suggest is the alternative? To equitably empower the poor and the wealthy even though the poor cost more to empower and have less potential to give back to the country? If you want a wealthy country, I imagine you have strike a balance that favors empowering the wealthy.

dragonwriter5• 3 years ago

If you are a retail worker and your boss withholds $20 from your paycheck, it's not considered criminal theft.

Yes, it is, in California, at least (and, as of this year, if it was over $950 instead of $20, it would be felony grand theft of wages, rather than a misdemeanor theft.)

Of course, criminal process has a higher proof bar and requires a public prosecutor to care enough to do something, doesn’t improve recovery for the victim, and is usually slower, so actual recovery is probably going to happen through civil/administrative process even if a crime is on the books and applicable.

chung8123• 3 years ago

I wonder how you could make that criminal. Do you charge the manager making the schedule?

wnevets• 3 years ago

but the justice system in the US will almost always punish a burglar more harshly.

mattpallissard• 3 years ago

Agreed. Let's not forget who the real criminals are

dheera• 3 years ago

Investors as well, who handshake and even sign deals without wiring funds.

Sometimes that causes companies to abruptly shutdown and not meet payroll.

It should be criminal to sign a term sheet and not wire funds, and even in the case of a handshake deal employees should have recourse to get their last paycheck with that investor AND extend their H1B validity for an additional 6 months to find a job.

vlunkr• 3 years ago

And racoons steal your garbage. I'm not sure what either of those has to do with the article though.

RhodesianHunter2• 3 years ago

Institutionalized theft unimpeded by the government is the broader point.

robocat3• 3 years ago

If “wage theft” is relevant, then so is time theft (employees getting paid for time they didn’t work)

* Time theft causes U.S. employers more than $400 billion per year lost in productivity.

* In a survey done in 2015, 43% of employees admitted to deliberately committing time theft. And, 25% of employees admitted to reporting more hours than they actually worked 75% to 100% of the time!

skeaker2• 3 years ago

If “wage theft” is relevant, then so is time theft

How? Isn't this a whataboutism?

And do your bullet points have sources? They sound like the sort of thing a corrupt business would falsely report.

rightbyte2• 3 years ago

How is "time theft" a good name for this?

"Time theft" should be stealing the employees' time, by not paying.

Pretending to work could be called "wage theft" too, as the employee could be comsidered stealing wage from the employer.

Edit: Oh ... ye ok got it. "Time theft" works both ways too.

NotYourLawyer5• 3 years ago

Civil asset forfeiture is disgusting and ought to be ruled unconstitutional. However, most of the stuff they seize really is crime-related.

wahnfrieden9• 3 years ago

Source? Or did you make that up

NotYourLawyer5• 3 years ago

It doesn’t pass the smell test that it could be false. Call that “made up” if you like.

standardUser2• 3 years ago

That's because there's too many crimes, mostly relating to drugs. If we were to make caffeine illegal tomorrow then there would be a lot of "crime-related" money seized from the coffee industry, but it's only "crime-related" because we're dumb enough to consider a victimless act a crime.

221qqwe2• 3 years ago

Technically indiscriminately selling literal poison with a very low LD50 to people with "somewhat" poor impulse control is a victimless crime, sure.

Of course, I guess, fentanyl et al. are a thing because more benign drugs were criminalized for so long. However in no way does that make hard drugs comparable to caffeine though... Do you believe that all substances must be legalized and widely available?

LammyL• 3 years ago

If it is crime related, then the courts could impose criminal asset forfeiture (aka a fine) after a criminal conviction.

Civil asset forfeiture needs to disappear completely and forever.

lnxg33k1• 3 years ago

It is sometimes not as straightforward, as I think we have that in order to prevent people from having enough funds to escape courts, as in, without money it's harder to flee law. Now some middle class criminals might be affected, some high class criminals might have funds around the world in rogue states and might be able to flee anyway, the issue as usual seem to be of the randomers, always taking the biggest hit of any law done to prevent crime

But I think in this case the issue is not the tool to freeze or seize assets in itself, which used pragmatically helps society, is the accountability of those who exploit it

I have vibes regarding this like those who said ok there are some shitty cops who shot people, then let’s defund the police

hgsgm3• 3 years ago

They do and that is included in the total, as the article states.

aqme28• 3 years ago

However, most of the stuff they seize really is crime-related.

I don't really see how that matters. Most people tried for murder are guilty, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't have their day in court.

NotYourLawyer5• 3 years ago

It’s relevant to the claim that cops are taking more stuff than burglars. Most of the stuff the cops are taking is crime proceeds!

Finnucane• 3 years ago

Sure, but penalties for crimes have limits and civil forfeiture doesn't, which raises constitutional issues itself.

RajT88• 3 years ago

For seizures of sums of cash as little as $100 (mentioned in the article), I very much doubt that to be true.

In practice, however, civil forfeiture is often wielded against regular people who aren’t doing anything wrong. In many states the typical cash forfeiture amount is in the hundreds of dollars — $423 in Michigan, or $369 in Pennsylvania, according to the latest data from the Institute for Justice, a law firm that represents forfeiture victims and tracks the practice nationwide. In many cities police departments have been known to make seizures of less than $100 on the flimsiest pretenses, typically concentrated in the poorest neighborhoods.

The usage of 'typical' sounds like they mean 'average', for such precise numbers.

NotYourLawyer5• 3 years ago

I didn’t realize IJ was involved in this, but good for them. They do great work.

phone8675309• 3 years ago

However, most of the stuff they seize really is crime-related.

Torture might be an effective way to get most criminals to confess and getting a slam dunk conviction when going to trial where a jury may mistakenly exonerate them, but that doesn't mean that it's the _right_ or even _moral_ way to do so.

Further, ask yourself this - what is a crime? Answer - it's whatever the legislature says it is, and as a political body they are influenced by what the dominant group in power wants.

test0983• 3 years ago

how are you able to make this claim?

"Although there are accessible statistics of seizures at the federal level, it often happens that the totals of forfeitures from both criminals and innocent owners are combined; for example, one report was that in 2010, government seized $2.5 billion in assets from criminals and innocent owners by forfeiture methods,[16] and the totals of assets seized incorrectly from innocent owners was not separated statistically. Further, since the United States is a federal republic with governments at both the national and state level, there are civil forfeiture seizures at the state level, which are not tracked and recorded in any central database,[12] which make it difficult to make assessments, since state laws and procedures vary widely."

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...

NotYourLawyer5• 3 years ago

There’s just no way that they’re mostly seizing innocent people’s stuff.

phyllistine• 3 years ago

[Citation Needed]

SkipperCat• 3 years ago

Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime and if they don't they should be forced to return all of your property.

I've read articles about how some police departments are training their staff to engage in this behavior and using forfeiture as a profit center. What they are doing is wholesale theft.

wahnfrieden9• 3 years ago

The money is often used on personal expenditures like a new F-350 truck for personal use, commemorative Super Bowl badges, or premium salmon-jerky dogfood (actual examples from Georgia). Most seized money does not even get put into a general fund for budget-based reallocation and is left up to discretionary "slush fund" use.

bsder• 3 years ago

The "proper" solution is that any property, cash, fines, etc. produced by the "criminal justice" system goes only to victims and anything extra should always go into a fund that gets returned directly to the citizens.

It doesn't go into a budget. It doesn't fund anything else. Anything collected goes to victims or it goes back to the people.

This would stop ALL of the perverse incentives.

maxbond9• 3 years ago

Not quite all, the arbitrary exercise of power is itself an incentive. You can use it to intimidate people or to punish people you don't have the evidence to prosecute (which is to say, those with the presumption of innocence).

That would help a ton though.

Gibbon13• 3 years ago

After thinking of this exact thing for maybe 30 years I think all fines, etc should be turned over to the Social Security Administration. Advantage something like 98% of the money transferred to SS goes right back out the door.

asveikau• 3 years ago

Victims of crime should not be given special powers. If anything, their biased position makes them less able to understand that the accused has rights, should be evaluated impartially, are presumed innocent, and shouldn't be subject to unfair punishment if proven guilty.

I'm really tired of seeing internet commentary on "tough on crime" attitudes where people think victims are basically judge and jury, possibly omniscient, and their hurt and revenge fantasies should decide policy for millions of unrelated people, supersedes the needs of everybody else, like our need to have an impartial justice system and prevent wrongful conviction.

But getting back to your comment, if you want to know where the "perverse incentive" is in your proposal, it creates incentive for someone to falsely present themselves as a victim of a crime.

willcipriano2• 3 years ago

Nope, here are the rules: https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-4/

No time limit nonsense, get a warrant. Charge them with a crime. That's the law no matter what the idiots running courthouses in this country think, your precedent has no power here.

readthenotes1• 3 years ago

It's more like: any assets taken by civil asset forfeiture should fund civics classes so that the people that are having their property stolen know just how anti-American that is.

jh00ker• 3 years ago

If I check a suitcase full of money on my flight, or if I pass it through TSA security, I must consent to being searched (without a warrant) in order to fly.

It's not like I have a suitcase of money in my trunk and I've been pulled over by the police without cause and I can refuse to give consent.

Therefore I don't think the 4 amendment applies.

Isn't the argument for CAF that the mere possession of the large sum of money is just cause to confiscate it? That's why a time limit would work. DUring that time period, they could try to get a warrant. The judge would not give a warrant if that is the only evidence. Then the assets would be returned.

specialist2• 3 years ago

Right. Your point is obvious and correct.

But. You naively assume judicial philosophy must be bound by rules, logic, common sense, ethics, public interest, or precedent.

Strike: ~~The Bill of Rights applies to people, not property. To rationalize civil forfeiture, the reactionaries created a legal fiction that property has agency unto itself. Further, property can be suspected of wrong doing, even by just by existing.~~

Edit: To rationalize civil forfeiture, the reactionaries claims the Bill of Rights applies to people, not property. Further, they created a legal fiction that property has agency unto itself. So property can be suspected of wrong doing, even by just by existing.

Worse, the rules for civil forfeiture are flipped. Whereas people charged in criminal court are presumed innocent until proven guilty, somehow property must be proven innocent. Apparently courts can prove a negative, even if logic cannot.

IANAL. Trying to grok the judicial philosophies of the r/iamverysmart reactionaries breaks my brain. These helped me kinda grasp what's happening:

Bennis v. Michigan

"On this week’s episode of 5-4, Peter (@The_Law_Boy), Rhiannon (@AywaRhiannon), and Michael (@_FleerUltra) talk about civil forfeiture, the practice that lets police seize private property if it’s suspected of being involved in a crime."

https://www.fivefourpod.com/episodes/bennis-v-michigan/

Civil versus criminal forfeiture

"...assets are seized by police based on a suspicion of wrongdoing, and without having to charge a person with specific wrongdoing, with the case being between police and the thing itself, sometimes referred to by the Latin term in rem, meaning "against the property"; the property itself is the defendant and no criminal charge against the owner is needed."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...

michaelmior• 3 years ago

unreasonable searches and seizures

Unfortunately, unreasonable is subject to interpretation. I'm not saying it's right, but some could plausibly interpret civil forfeiture as "reasonable."

Sohcahtoa822• 3 years ago

CAF shouldn't be happening. Period.

The government suspects someone of committing a crime? File charges and bring them to court.

At the very least, CAF should require a warrant. Cops should not be able to seize assets as part of a typical traffic stop.

I just can't see how CAF has survived so long without being ruled a violation of our Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures.

RhodesianHunter2• 3 years ago

People seem to think the police exist to enforce laws and justice.

The police exist to maintain and protect existing power structures, including the police themselves.

A lot starts making more sense in that context.

mulmen16• 3 years ago

90 days is a long time. Imagine a recent college graduate moving cross country to a new city in search of work. They are unlikely to have resources to live for 90 days if the cops seize all their cash.

The cops can get a warrant. If they can’t convince a judge then they don’t need to seize anything. The police serve us, not the other way around.

ModernMech• 3 years ago

Local police bar near me has a sign above the entry that says “brothers before others”.

They know who they serve. Seems to be themselves.

empyrrhicist• 3 years ago

Sounds like a nice incentive to charge people with crimes they didn't commit...

brewdad3• 3 years ago

That would still be an improvement over today where one never needs to be charged with a crime at all and only the stack of cash has a right to defend itself in court.

masklinn2• 3 years ago

Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime

I think you are slightly confused. Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime (hence civil asset forfeiture, rather than criminal asset forfeiture), and the government charges the property itself, the owner is a third party claimant.

bhelkey• 3 years ago

I believe 'should' is the operative word in that comment. They don't claim the world works that way but that it should.

abigail953• 3 years ago

The argument being made is that the structure of the government in the USA defines persons and effects as both being part of the 4A with the same standard of protection against unreasonable search and seizure.

The language of the clause means you can't disconnect persons, houses, papers, and effects.

People are secure in their persons, their houses, their effects.

It's not a weird quirk of some conflicting criminal/civil law.

It's part of the document that binds all other laws.

Making people a third party to their effects means you could also do that to their person, which is complete nonsense.

Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime

But it certainly does require suspicion of wrongdoing. You can't just walk up and take something from someone just because you don't charge them.

AmVess2• 3 years ago

CAF abuse is so widespread that it should be abolished.

lost_tourist2• 3 years ago

I think it shouldn't exist unless the person they take stuff from is convicted, and say a year or two has elapsed, before anything in a cache has to be returned to them, and returned immediately if they are proven guilty.

petedrexel• 3 years ago

Under the guise of "protecting and serving". A lot of these guys are the bad guys and having a badge doesn't change that.

rm_-rf_slash• 3 years ago

My brother had his phone stolen when he was in middle school.

He and everyone suspected one classmate. Cops searched him and found the phone and other stolen phones. They were all taken into “evidence” and refused to give it back no matter how many times we asked.

We had to buy a new phone.

Fuckers.

ajmurmann2• 3 years ago

It's completely astonishing how low the ethics standards are for police officers in the US! Even if this is the standard procedure, you'd expect that a decent person tries to work the system in favor of kids whose phone was stolen. But what do we expect from police officers who typically require less training to become an officer than is needed to get a license as a cosmetician?! I dream of a US where it takes 1.5 to 2 years of schooling to become a police officer. Where officers take hundreds of hours in law, ethics and de-escalation classes. I want police officers who have book clubs in which they have heated discussions about Kant's and Foucault. I want police officers who are passionate and knowledgeable about justice, are true experts in law enforcement and improving our society and hold each other accountable! I don't think that's unreasonable, given this is equivalent to the professionalism I expect from other people who are good at their profession.

1letterunixname4• 3 years ago

There's a process for recovering property from the police. Did you do more than ask some beat cop who's first instinct is likely to be unhelpful because they're an untouchable mafia?

https://www.lawyers.com/legal-info/criminal/criminal-law-bas...

justrealist• 3 years ago

This conflates "Civil Asset Forfeiture" with "Asset Forfeiture", and any analysis which doesn't preserve that distinction is meaningless.

Bernie Madoff had his assets seized. That's not wrong, illegal, or unconstitutional.

_ea1k• 3 years ago

I see a lot of commenters pointing out that this includes legitimate forfeiture due to criminal activity.

That is certainly true. But how do you measure legitimate vs illegitimate taking of property?

With burglary, it is fairly trivial. But otherwise? I'm not aware of statistics breaking down the amount of money and assets that get taken without any charges.

1letterunixname4• 3 years ago

I seriously doubt the police ever publish stats on seized property they were forced to return because no crime was committed.

Most of the time, the people who are robbed by the police can't afford or don't know how to get their property back.

https://archive.is/o7xdQ

toss1• 3 years ago

>a cash-sniffing dog with the Dallas Police Department alerted on a suitcase that had been checked in at Love Field for a domestic flight to Chicago. Officers subsequently searched the bag and found over $100,000 in cash inside.

Likely alerted to the scent of drug residues on the bills, which is supposedly on essentially every bill in circulation.

So, perhaps the owner of the cash might have been better off by first putting it in a washing machine with soap, i.e. physically laundering the money?

tristor• 3 years ago

No. They actually train dogs to alert on cash, specifically. The scent they train on is the scent of the special ink used to print US currency. They do this because large amounts of cash moving between cities/states is often a hallmark of organized crime.

wahnfrieden9• 3 years ago

And because they can freely take cash for personal use when they find it.

1letterunixname4• 3 years ago

Cash sniffing dogs for the express purpose of robbing citizens without any reasonable suspicion, much less probable cause.

If contraband or other crimes were involved, then I say seize property, but the police shouldn't be the Sheriff of Nottingham looking for citizens to rob.

nick-of-time• 3 years ago

Or the dog alerted on nothing, since they have a bonkers false positive rate: https://www.smh.com.au/environment/conservation/sniffer-dogs...

umvi• 3 years ago

I want closure on the 25 year old woman and the $100k she was transporting in a suitcase. Did she go to court to get it back? Or is this a situation where 9 times out of 10 the cash was ill-gotten and so it is forfeited to avoid criminal charges?

IshKebab3• 3 years ago

Almost certainly. I can't think of any other reason you'd take $100k on a plane.

But there are plenty of stories out there of people having very large amounts taken from them on their way to buy cars or whatever. The story probably picked a bad example but the police are definitely just taking whatever they can get without any regard for justice.

1letterunixname4• 3 years ago

Rushing to close a deal on a high value asset such as a boat, aircraft, or real estate where the seller insists on actual cash. Granted, you should probably use some form of durable check, but some buyers want actual cash. There are also cultural business habits in some ethnicity/national backgrounds to prefer actual cash over safer bank instruments.

It really doesn't matter: if someone wants to carry a large quantity of cash on a plane, this is still an open society and freedom must be defended.

elcritch2• 3 years ago

Everytime this comes up I'm utterly shocked how such blatant violation of the fourth amendment hasn't been struck down by the supreme court. Especially for conservatives it should be a clear case of governmental overreach. For the liberal side what about defunding the police stuff? Its clear niether political party actually cares about following the constitution, which is just a let down.

Maybe we need a "NRA" for money, property, and encryption.

yieldcrv3• 3 years ago

its been upheld by the courts in a variety of ways:

one that the 4th amendment doesn't apply because you haven't proved its yours. the text says "The right of the people to be secure in their" so it applies after you prove it is something you have the right to be secure of to begin with! and if there is something illegal you incriminate yourself in the process and it switches to a criminal charge against you and the associated criminal asset forfeiture.

but our new supreme court will re-examine it more decisively, lets wait till next year and see what happens!

elcritch2• 3 years ago

one that the 4th amendment doesn't apply because you haven't proved its yours. the text says "The right of the people to be secure in their" so it applies after you prove it is something you have the right to be secure of to begin with!

Wow, that's almost literally the logic of a playground bully: "well you can't prove it's yours therefore it's mine".

yieldcrv3• 3 years ago

The rationale for civil asset forfeiture should be applied to random bank branches, and the practice will meet its natural conclusion extremely quickly.

but that is the clearest depiction of this caste system. people that can obviously fight do not have their cash and effects seized.

brewdad3• 3 years ago

Ah, see, the cash that was stolen? That was your cash. We, the bank, only hold onto your cash for safekeeping. Your balance has been reduced appropriately.

jokoon• 3 years ago

The US is such a scary country

wahnfrieden9• 3 years ago

Civil forfeiture is a problem in Canada as well. I don't know much about elsewhere

TheHappyOddish• 3 years ago

Lots of other countries have it, but they call it 'corruption'.

asdfman1233• 3 years ago

Almost everything is ugly when you look at it up close

legitster• 3 years ago

That pattern has held true for three of the last six years, although numbers in 2014 and 2015 were skewed somewhat by big, legitimate forfeiture cases involving huge sums of cash: the Bernie Madoff scandal, for instance.

This is a pretty big freaking caveat. If you actually look at the DOJ source, about $1 billion a year comes from low-level seizures (https://www.justice.gov/d9/pages/attachments/2020/02/09/afp_...) Almost all of the rest comes from huge white-collar busts.

The white collar seizures almost work the exact same way. Toyota was never charged with a crime over their accelerator pedal issue. But the government just seized 1.2 billion from them and kept a huge chunk of it for themselves.

XxCincinnatusxX• 3 years ago

They used this law against me in East Texas. Cost me $8000 to get my car back. They threatened me into signing a confession note. There police station looked like a pawn shop on steroids.

khazhoux• 3 years ago

What did you confess to?

joker_minmax• 3 years ago

I'd like to get more into cash budgeting (i.e., withdraw a set amount at the beginning of the month so I have to physically analyze my spending, in-person at least) but this kind of thing has always made me nervous to do it. I can only feel like civil forfeiture will be used as a part of the broader attack on cash in coming years.

tim333• 3 years ago

As a Brit I'm puzzled Americans put up with this. Couldn't you lobby your politicians to like stop the cops stealing?

breakpointalpha2• 3 years ago

We do. The politicians actively support it because they are pro-cop.

Cops still take more stuff from people than burglars do (2021)

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