Methinks you are correct. Still, this is a good thing, regardless of the motivation. But it doesn’t go nearly far enough.
What galls me is that the gutless Supremes haven’t reined this in already. It is a corrupt practice to seize property absent a preponderance of evidence that the property was the fruit of a crime, converted from the fruit of a crime or directly and knowingly used by its owner in the commission or facilitation of crime.
This BS of seizing grandma’s house because the grandson sold a bag of weed out of his car while parked in the driveway needed to be stopped long ago.
Just about every time it's come before the court, the conservative justices have supported the practice. Law and order, don'tcha know.
Just about every time it's come before the court, the conservative justices have supported the practice. Law and order, don'tcha know.
I’m fairly certain the SC has ruled on this and said it was OK.
This is basically saying that one is guilty until proven innocent. I know personally of several nasty related situations. One person in DC had a mother dying of a long term illness. They signed something for Medicare to get treatment. After they died Medicare said they owed $600,000 for the mother’s treatment and would seize the house toward the payment. The person signing the papers either had no understanding or did not see anything about having such a responsibility. DC has a “one month Vacant Property law” which says if you leave your property vacant for one month you have to register it as a Vacant Property. If you do that they immediately hit you with a tax bill SIX times the regular tax bill. There are exemptions, but it is a real pain to have to prove your property is not vacant if someone, a neighbor or real estate person is after the property, reports it to the tax authority. One person I know, a lawyer yet, registered their renovation property and were hit with a 3 year back taxes at 6 times, plus penalty and interest of more than $100,000. They lost their dream house. Another person was reported by someone because they were not spending “enough” time in their home of many years and was hit by 3 years back taxes and penalty and interest and were not entitled to their elderly exemption. To appeal the case to the Superior Court, they must first pay the very large tax bill, which if they win the city might take as much as two years to refund.
There are many laws of this type throughout the country, and they especially seem to target the elderly and sick and need to be fought wherever they exist before YOU become the next victim. Real Estate lawyers have been known to use such laws to get property.
If you are stopped by the cops and have a load of cash on you they can take it. Federal Marshals used to go around in airports asking people if they had a lot of cash on them. If they did, it was taken under the pretense they were probably going somewhere to buy drugs. One guy owned a nursery and was going to buy some trees from a seller who would only take case. (This was before it was easy to get cash anywhere.) The money was taken from him by federal marshals. This was on 20/20 back when they did investigative reporting.
The “authorities” have been trampling on peoples’ rights for decades and it’s only gotten worse.
I was reading a piece by Frank Serpico the other day. He says things are just as bad as always. He also said “Cops today have an us vs them attitude.”