I got my latest New Yorker on my Kindle this morning, and while browsing through it, I ran into an article that sounded intriguing entitled Taken. I was utterly shocked and dumbfounded at what I read. I could not put down this article!
It turns out (why did have I never heard about this?) that municipalities, states, and even the Justice Department have the LEGAL right to deprive innocent citizens of their money, cars, homes, and even their children, if they are just SUSPECTED of wrongdoing.
In fact, there are entire police departments and district attorney offices that could not even FUNCTION without the money and goods so procured!
The article starts off with the story of a couple passing through the small town of Tenaha, Texas, with their two sons. They were on their way to buy a used car with several thousand dollars they had in cash in the glove compartment. In Tenaha, they are pulled over by a police car. The cops asked if they could search the car for drugs. They found the cash and a glass pipe that was a gift. They then told them to come to the police station, and escorted them there. Here's what happened:
The county’s district attorney, a fifty-seven-year-old woman with feathered Charlie’s Angels hair named Lynda K. Russell, arrived an hour later. Russell, who moonlighted locally as a country singer, told Henderson and Boatright [the couple] that they had two options. They could face felony charges for “money laundering” and “child endangerment,” in which case they would go to jail and their children would be handed over to foster care. Or they could sign over their cash to the city of Tenaha, and get back on the road. “No criminal charges shall be filed,” a waiver she drafted read, “and our children shall not be turned over to CPS,” or Child Protective Services.
Follow me over the jump for more horror stories.
This is something called "civil forfeiture," which was originally aimed at helping with the prosecution of huge drug cartels or other big-time crooks. It allows law enforcement agents to confiscate suspects' possessions and cash BEFORE they are even convicted of any wrongdoing, if they have a suspicion that said possessions have been procured by illicit means, or purchased using illicitly-gained moneys (e.g. sale of drugs).
This law is, however, being used by many local municipalities to fund much of their operations, targeting mostly low-income and minority citizens who may have immigration vulnerabilities, or be otherwise unable to mount a challenge.
In general, you needn’t be found guilty to have your assets claimed by law enforcement; in some states, suspicion on a par with “probable cause” is sufficient. Nor must you be charged with a crime, or even be accused of one. Unlike criminal forfeiture, which requires that a person be convicted of an offense before his or her property is confiscated, civil forfeiture amounts to a lawsuit filed directly against a possession, regardless of its owner’s guilt or innocence.
and:
Owners who wish to contest often find that the cost of hiring a lawyer far exceeds the value of their seized goods. Washington, D.C., charges up to twenty-five hundred dollars simply for the right to challenge a police seizure in court, which can take months or even years to resolve
Then there's the story of James Morrow, and employee of Tyson foods in Arkansas. (This also occurred in Tehana, which apparently makes a living off of this sort of thing.) He was pulled over and $3900 that he was carrying in order to get dental work (he was on his way to the dentist) was confiscated. The cops said they smelled "burned marijuana" in the car. He told them he could offer proof that he had withdrawn the money from his bank, but they ignored him and took him to jail. They also took his car. When he "agreed" to let them have his property, they let him off by the side of the road with no car and no money.
And there's the story of Dale Agostini, an immigrant from Guyana and the owner of a Caribbean restaurant in Washington, D.C. He was carrying a large amount of cash to buy restaurant equipment when he was pulled over by the cops, with his fiance and infant son. They took the money, his baby, and sent him and his fiance to jail for the night.
This law has been on the books for several decades, but was rarely used until in 1984 Congress passed the Comprehensive Crime Control Act, allowing law enforcement agencies to be the beneficiaries of compounded goods and money. Since then, such forfeitures have skyrocketed.
At the federal level, the Justice Department has made a lot of money off of this type of procedure:
At the Justice Department, proceeds from forfeiture soared from twenty-seven million dollars in 1985 to five hundred and fifty-six million in 1993. (Last year, the department took in nearly $4.2 billion in forfeitures, a record.)
The problem seems to be especially acute in Texas (surprise, surprise!):
In Hunt County, Texas, I found officers scoring personal bonuses of up to twenty-six thousand dollars a year, straight from the forfeiture fund. In Titus County, forfeiture pays the assistant district attorney’s entire salary.
In other words, these procedures are a huge moneymaker for local law enforcement agencies (not to mention the Justice Department!), meaning they will not be easy to get rid of.
I urge everyone to read this entire article. It is infuriating! I am hoping MSNBC or some other entity will interview the author and make this more well known. I certainly knew nothing about this!
UPDATE: Fixed the link (finally!). Didn't know you couldn't just put in the HTML but had to use the Link button.