Both. Crooked politicians take advantage of bad laws. This is why the Constitution was designed to limit the power of government.
The reality is that the law protects the citizen from a crooked official because it specifically states that the citizen will be compensated.
That's not reality, that's your legal theory. The reality is that it often isn't practical for citizens to recover from government abuse. I could cite multiple abuses of eminent domain, criminal forfeiture or New Orleans cops illegally seizing guns during emergencies. We can't trust them -- that's reality . We shouldn't be giving these people new laws to justify their thieving.
The reality of life contradicts your lofty ideals.
Most understand that this is beneficial and, in spite of the fact that it may-could-might be exploited, would support it.
You point to isolated events of exploitation even without such a law. On the other hand, there are vastly more examples of individuals volunteering their property,money, and time to help others.