I don’t care whether he intended to pay taxes on that money or not. I don’t care whether he intended to use that money for “legitimate” purposes or not. It was stolen by law enforcement, and I’m glad he’s getting his money back. I hope he will also recover damages. Stealing is not okay, not even when government officials are the ones engaged in theft.
Exactly. And more to the point, even if he had been paid in cash for gigs and wasn’t “intending” to pay taxes on it, no crime would have been committed until he filed a fraudulent tax return by not reporting the income, up until that time, he did nothing illegal it was no one’s business, including that of the police. Unless we are now into Minority Report territory and arresting or punishing people for “pre-crimes”.