What might be even worse is that those frequently carrying on the activity this is supposed to be stopping (mainly street drug trafficking) is so lucrative that they treat this as a TAX. They are getting milked but not punished out of existence.
We have a game of sheer ego here, folks, not a game of virtue. Nobody wants to really win the drug war. That would defund a lot of applecarts if they did.
...they are getting milked...
Sometimes it involves a car which belongs to parents that is used in drug deals, and they don’t know its being used by “junior” to transport and sell drugs. The parents usually can get the car back, but they are stuck with the expense.
What is really wrong is seizure of legally possessed large amounts of cash. Say, buying a $30,000 classic car and the seller accepts only cash.
A cop can take that $30,000 you have on you for the car purchase, and the burden is on you to get it back.