Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Policing For Profit: How Civil Asset Forfeiture Has Perverted American Law Enforcement
The current state of civil asset forfeiture in the United States is one of almost naked tyranny. Don’t believe us? Listen to the latest Resistance Library Podcast.
Picture this: You’re driving home from the casino and you’ve absolutely cleaned up – to the tune of $50,000. You see a police car pull up behind you, but you can’t figure out why. Not only have you not broken any laws, you’re not even speeding. But the police officer doesn’t appear to be interested in charging you with a crime. Instead, he takes your gambling winnings, warns you not to say anything to anyone unless you want to be charged as a drug kingpin, then drives off into the sunset.
This actually happened to Tan Nguyen, and his story is far from unique. On this episode on the Resistance Library Podcast, Dave and Sam discuss the topic of civil asset forfeiture, a multi-billion dollar piggybank for state, local, and federal police departments to fund all sorts of pet projects.
With its origins in the British fight against piracy on the open seas, civil asset forfeiture is nothing new. During Prohibition, police officers often seized goods, cash, and equipment from bootleggers in a similar manner to today. However, contemporary civil asset forfeiture begins right where you’d think that it would: The War on Drugs.
In 1986, as First Lady Nancy Reagan encouraged America’s youth to “Just Say No,” the Justice Department started the Asset Forfeiture Fund. This sparked a boom in civil asset forfeiture that’s now become self-reinforcing, as the criminalization of American life and asset forfeiture have continued to feed each other.
In sum, asset forfeiture creates a motivation to draft more laws by the legislature, while more laws create greater opportunities for seizure by law enforcement. This perverse incentive structure is having devastating consequences: In 2014 alone, law enforcement took more stuff from American citizens than burglars did.
You can read the full article Policing For Profit: How Civil Asset Forfeiture Has Perverted American Law Enforcement at Ammo.com.
Published in Policing
Can seek to recover? Why should the State be entitled to seize property without first proving a crime? That is an utterly repulsive position which has no place in a society of free citizens. Slaves, maybe, but not citizens.
If he’s still in the area and you can see him, then pretty darned likely. But you can see that police officer and he’s taking that money from you without even blushing and there’s nothing you can do about it.
There is no defense of this behavior, and the courts have kowtowed to the police and politicians in a misguided effort to stem drug trafficking. But they still can’t keep drugs out of jails, let alone keep from crossing a 3,000 mile border and thousands of miles of coastline, and innumerable places to land aircraft. We have sacrificed our rights to enrich the government with no due process and no effective appeal.
Separate issues. By all means take it to your state legislature etc. But carrying around a lot of cash is still unwise.
Again, Separate issues. By all means take it to your state legislature etc. But carrying around a lot of cash is still unwise.
In each instance the buyer brought the money to where the seller lives. My purchase trip was overnight, and two of the times I sold were overnight trips for the buyers.
Motorcycles are relatively cheap, but people do stuff like this for cars, trucks, tractors, etc. The fake bank check problem is seller risk, and sending the money ahead of the deal is buyer risk. Cash means the sale and payment happen simultaneously.
The only point I wanted to make was that substantial cash deals where you are traveling with the cash are pretty common.
So you’re putting police in the mix with criminals then.
Everyone has known for forever that if you carry large sums of money that you are subject to having it robbed from you. But still people carry it and and rarely get robbed. Why should we fear the police as well?
But mostly, why should we additionally live with sanctioned police theft? Why should we ever need to take additional measures to protect ourselves from it?
I’m not talking about the wisdom of carrying large amounts of cash. Nor am I interested in discussing that with you. I’m talking only about the gross injustice of civil asset forfeiture laws.
Fine, take it up with the city councils, state legislatures, SCOTUS if you want. But even if you win at all of that, carrying around a lot of cash is still risky. And in the real world, the risk is going to be more from people who aren’t police.
I take it that this infringement on our rights does not trouble you. (As for street crime, I haven’t carried large amounts of cash since I went on vacation overseas with a wallet full of cash and travelers checks. But feel free to keep diverting the discussion away from civil rights.)
If only we had larger bills…
what is a travelers check? I’m kidding but many people don’t know what those are
This was the first disappointment I had with Trump. When Sessions said that civil asset forfeiture would stand. And with it Kelo. I don’t understand the thinking. It’s theft, as far as I can see. And
it’s built itselfthe police have built it up into an industry.But also, when overseas the $100 bill gets the best conversion rates, and it doesn’t require a $35 fee to be charged and a 3 or 4% conversion fee from your credit card company, as happens when you withdraw from an ATM. And frankly, even in the US, using an ATM in some areas is riskier that carrying cash.
Actually, a couple of people have tried to pick my pocket at one time or another, but they weren’t successful, and I always keep a throw away wallet anyway. I must say, the closest I ever felt I had gotten to losing my cash was by the airport police — both overseas and in the US.
Anyway, I don’t fear being mugged, if I fear anything it’s being pulled over.
You mean like 8″ by 11″?
500 or 1000
I don’t often disagree with Jerry Giordano, but when I do, I prefer to disagree on his support of the violation of the presumption of innocence and right to due process in the case of civil forfeiture.
— The Most Conservative Man in the World
Can I hear an ‘Amen’?
I’m having trouble following your logic. Paul said he is not addressing the wisdom of carrying large amounts of cash. That means that any counter-argument about the wisdom of carrying large amounts of cash is a straw man argument.
(amen)
Sorry but “this is my argument and you’re not allowed to point out the obvious flaw” doesn’t work on me.
Indeed that’s what the left does all the time.
Huh? I think we’ve once again encountered the impossibility of two people with different systems of logic and language communicating mutually intelligible ideas!
I agreed right off that the police shouldn’t do that. The method to stop it, is not complaining on websites etc, but instead by dealing with the state legislatures, etc. Meanwhile, acknowledging that the smart thing to do – cops or not – is to not walk/drive around with a lot of cash (especially at night, in bad neighborhoods, yadda yadda) means the cops can’t take it either. (Although it sometimes sounds like what at least some of the people who get cranked up about this REALLY want to do is walk/drive around with a lot of cash, HOPING the cops take it, so they REALLY have something to complain about.)
Does law enforcement no longer freeze assets? Instead they seize?
It’s not just cash. Cars, equipment, all kinds of stuff have been taken under civil asset forfeiture. Police who suspect that you have property that might have been purchased with drug proceeds can take it in most states, without ever charging you with a crime. But hey, maybe that’s your fault for indulging in risky behavior. Like owning a lawn mower, when the cops need a new one.
You tell us that we should not discuss this? On a website specifically created to discuss politics? Really? I seriously question your sincerity in saying that you disapprove of asset seizure without trial.
?? I don’t understand this. It’s easier than ever to validate a check.
Okay, how? It takes several days for a check to clear. In those several days, an account can be emptied and the seller is left with nothing while his car is gone. A cashier’ s check is more reliable because the money is already transferred, but I know I can’t tell if the cashier’ s check is valid or just a pretty piece of paper.
You continue to miss the point. The police could just as easily taken his car (and have – there are auctions where seized property is sold – cars, boats, motorcycles, RVs, etc) with the proceeds going to the law enforcement agency that took them(or seized, if you prefer).
Children say, That isn’t fair. Adults say, I want justice. Police are the enforcement part of the Justice System. When a society has to protect itself from the enforcers of its system of justice, there is much more wrong than simply the statistical probability of being a victim of crime.
And… civil asset forfeiture is a sin. It is three sins in one. It violates three of the ten Commandments, and violates specific instruction to law enforcement.
This verse from the Bible bears repeating:
Soldiers were at the time the equivalent of federal law enforcement today. And the Bible has given simple instructions: Don’t take by force (or don’t steal); don’t make false accusations (don’t bear false witness); and be content with you wages (don’t covet).
A police officer saying that you got your stuff by breaking the law, is making a false accusation; he is bearing false witness.
When that police officer says, I’m confiscating that stuff I see – and good luck getting it back – he is taking it by force; he is stealing.
And when the police officer confiscates your stuff to enrich himself and his department, this is the opposite of being content with his wages; it is coveting.
That this violation of long-standing law, civil rights, moral law stands today is a shame upon the united States.
Civil asset forfeiture was originally marketed as a “necessary” tool for fighting out-of-control illegal drug dealers. In other words, it was expedient. “Let’s dispense with Constitutional protections in order to achieve something.” It was, of course, not only expedient but profitable.
kedavis, re the above reply to Paul.
The issue Ammo.com raised by the article is
Ammo.com expressed the opinion, “no”, and his/her argument for that opinion.
Jerry replied with the opposite opinion, “yes”, on the same issue, giving his logic.
Paul replied to that, agreeing with the answer in the OP and giving his rebuttal of Jerry’s logic.
So far, a normal conversational dialog–issue introduced, with opinion/ justification, and relevant replies to those comments with their justification, all with purpose of addressing the issue at hand through facts and logic.
At that point things got strange. You replied to Paul, but instead of agreeing with him or disagreeing and presenting your dispute with his logic or facts, you introduced a new issue unrelated to the dialog started in the article (“Is it prudent to carry large amounts of cash?”) and gave your answer to it.
To be honest, unlike the subject of the article, which is a hotly controversial, significant social issue of our times, your “Tip for Travelers” isn’t one that is of current public interest, and not even all that controversial: you said “no”, and all of us Ricochet parents taught our children the same thing.
When Paul pointed out that (a) the issue you interjected, out of the blue and (b) the one that the thread was debating were two different issues, you criticized that by pointing out that “they are two different issues” (!?)
I am familiar with this kind of car wreck in Ricochet discussions of controversial topics, and I think it comes from the fact that people are taught one or the other of two incompatible ways of thinking and of engaging in dialog (logical argument).
In the traditional one, a reply must be logically related to the comment being replied to, and to the issue at hand. In the other one, a counter-argument can be valid even if it is on an unrelated subject, as long as there is some concrete fact appearing, in some way, in both of them–something to trigger some subject in a commenter’s mind that he wants to discuss, in lieu of the present one.
In your case, the common concrete fact was that an arbitrary example of civil forfeiture was used which happened to involve someone carrying large amounts of cash. That was a trigger to start what we of the old school would consider a brand new dialog–ideally in a new article–but in this case, to present it as if it were a continuance of the current dialog.
There isn’t any way for a meaningful exchange to occur across this permanent chasm between thinking styles.