Posted on 06/22/2016 3:20:38 PM PDT by dontreadthis
It's the stuff of libertarian dreams. The IRS admits that it wrongfully took money from innocent citizens, and it gives the money back.
This is actually happening to victims of a little-known form of civil asset forfeiture carried out by the IRS on the premise of "structuring" violations. In case you didn't know, depositing or withdrawing just under $10,000 from your bank account multiple times is viewed as suspicious and possibly criminal activity. In a victory for lawmakers working to make it harder for the government to take property from innocent Americans, the Internal Revenue Service plans to give people who have had money seized over the last six years the chance to petition to get their money back, The Daily Signal has learned. According to a GOP source, the IRS told the House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee that it will send letters to everyone the agency seized money from for alleged structuring violations, which involves making consistent cash transactions of just under $10,000 to avoid reporting requirements, starting in October 2009. One petition has already been granted, and others are likely to follow.
The IRS has seized entire bank accounts with no notice or due process, alleging the owners sought to avoid federal bank reporting requirements. The aforementioned pattern of banking is described as "intentionally structuring cash transactions," and they call it a crime.
This nefarious provision of the Bank Secrecy Act is purportedly targeted at drug traffickers, money launderers and terrorists, but it has swept up hundreds of innocent peopleincluding small business owners who lost everything because they deal wholly or partly in cash.
Carole Hinders, owner of a Mexican restaurant in Iowa that only accepted cash, had her entire bank account of $33,000 seized even though she did nothing wrong. The IRS seized $63,000 from Randy Sowers, a dairy farmer in Maryland, because he was depositing under $10,000 into his bank account.
Ken Quran, the owner of a convenience store in North Carolina, had his entire bank account of $150,000 seized after working nonstop for years to build it up. His crime? Withdrawing cash from his bank account in amounts under $10,000. But the truly shocking thing is what happened next. A group of government agentsboth from the IRS and local policecame to Ken's store with an agreement already written up, under which Ken would agree to forever forfeit the money to the federal government. The agents searched his store with dogs, barred the entrance to keep out customers, and then demanded that he sign the paper. Ken initially refused, explaining that he did not read English well and did not want to sign an agreement he could not understand. Then, under compulsionafter one of the local police yelled and demanded that he sign, and after one of the IRS agents made clear that, otherwise, their next stop would be to talk to Ken's wife to pressure herKen agreed to sign. Between 2007 and 2013, the IRS seized $43 million in over 600 cases where only "structuring" violations were committed, according to the Institute for Justice (IJ). The IRS abandoned this policy in 2014 after IJ put heavy pressure on the agency through lawsuits and media exposure.
But the noble public interest law firm was not done. IJ pioneered a legal mechanism, called petitions for remission, to fight for the return of seized assets from closed cases involving only structural violations.
And, amazingly, it worked. IJ filed a petition to the IRS on behalf of Ken Quran, and the agency actually gave Quran all of his money back.
This is a startling admission of wrongdoing by the feared federal agency, and a rare win for liberty.
After an investigation by the House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee, the IRS has been forced to invite 700 other property owners with closed cases to petition for their money back. However, IRS said it has identified only 75 cases where money was wrongfully seized. The true number will be known after everyone goes through the process.
In a further rebuke to the agency, members of the Oversight Subcommittee have introduced a bill "that prohibits the IRS from seizing money from people who commit structuring violations unless the agency proves the money was tied to a crime."
These brazen acts by the IRS are only a small part of the enormous network of thievery called civil asset forfeiture that is cast upon the populace by every level of law enforcement. It has nothing to do with protecting and serving, and everything to do with policing for profit.
Countless innocent people across the country have had cash, assets and life savings stolen by local police departments, DEA and other agencies. Nothing but a fabricated suspicion of a crime is needed for this to happen, and the struggle to get one's assets back is often not worth the effort and legal fees.
Fortunately, this too is being fought by IJ and others who realize the sheer injustice of it all.
New Mexico became the first state to require a criminal conviction for asset forfeiture, effectively abolishing civil asset forfeiture, and other states are following suit. At the federal level, attention must be focused on the Equitable Sharing Program which allows local police departments to skirt state laws by sharing the loot with the feds.
Resistance is not futile. When the ugly truth of civil asset forfeiture is exposed, it can be stopped.
Good! Now what are the names of our government servants who are going to the federal penitentiary for doing this. The law applies to all or to no one!
So when do those involved begin serving prison terms?
Your CRIMINAL GOVERNMENT IN ACTION.
Vote Obastard/Vote Hitlery/Vote Democrat/Vote Republican = give them everything you have worked your entire life for, (at the muzzle of a gun).
Yeah, sometime in the next ten years or so and no interest.
Once upon a time a United States President was going to be impeached with one of the counts against him an alleged comment that the White House should use the IRS to attack their political enemies. He never did it, and he resigned before an impeachment trial convened in the Senate, but it was one of the things that brought down Richard M. Nixon.
Now, Barack H. Obama now does it with regularity without a blink of the eye. The White House is now running an organized crime syndicate with the Attorney General of the United States acting as the Crime Family counsel and the Congress of the United States ignoring everything because they are all on the take.
Under a system of equal justice, there would be grand larceny charges forthcoming against the IRS agents in these cases.
The police in Oklahoma scan your credit and bank cards and steal ALL your money during a traffic stop!
Mike Huckabee has called IRS a criminal enterprise.
Acts like THIS are what will launch the 2nd American Revolution.
“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.”
Not mine, they won’t. The officer that attempts it will die.
“New Mexico became the first state to require a criminal conviction for asset forfeiture...”
For those that do not follow too closely, that was Susanna Martinez, REPUBLICAN governor there, that signed the bill.
Had she not attacked Trump, she would likely be touring the country as his RUNNING MATE.
You can tell it’s an election year. d;^)
The RICO Act ought to cover it.
You laughed when I said that we live in a fascist dictatorship.
“The law applies to all or to no one!”
_________________________________________________
Sorry, we’ve since been fundamentally transformed. The law now applies to the little people only.
I did?
Agreed!
Take my dough under “color of law”. Pffft
Pssst. Officer. I got your name and your on video too.
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