Another BS argument. Addicts and people arrested for possessing small quantities of drugs are the ones who are being offered Diversion" or treatment programs. Dealers of any substantial quantity whatsoever should already be facing criminal charges - and those are the only dealers who have assets worth seizing.
So, they are either admitting they are not very good at arresting real drug dealers (aka "their job") - or they are telling us they routinely use "civil" asset forfeiture in cases of small-time drug possessors and/or junkies. Either way, they are going about it wrong.
What are they going to seize from a junkie - his "works" and his vomit and piss-stained sleeping bag?
Gut it.
No civil asset forfeiture without FIRST having a related conviction.
None. Not one thin dime.
Also make it a point of law that ONLY the financial institutions are responsible for reporting large transactions, not the folks doing business at the banks.
Moreover, along with gutting non-monetary damages in civil suits I would even also go with limiting asset forfeiture to only the stated fines allowed by statute.
Gut it.
from the article:
“Law enforcement and prosecutors can’t go after property unless it can be shown it was used in a crime, was gained through criminal action or bought with the proceeds of a crime. Alabama law lays out a clear process that prosecutors must follow in going after a criminal’s assets and an easy process for people to challenge the forfeiture.”
agree with this policy as long as the seizure is lawful, with complete transparency and accountability of those authorizing and executing the seizure and with due process for any claimants. i’ve got zero problem with keeping criminals from continuing to profit and commit additional crimes using their ill gotten gains.
fair for any person to challenge forfeiture in court.
They have to pay to get there money back? I don’t see anything fair about that.
I like the changes.
Sure the current rules help to fight crime but so does unlawful search and seizure.
First and foremost, civil asset forfeiture is a crime-fighting tool.
First bullet point - didn't take long to get to "it's a tool to use" formulation that actually means selective enforcement. It's a tool that may either be used or not at the discretion of the officer and the state he or she represents. What happened to due process here? Oh, we'll get to that...
Law enforcement and prosecutors can't go after property unless it can be shown it was used in a crime, was gained through criminal action or bought with the proceeds of a crime.
Well, that's a relief. "It can be shown" means due process, right? Uh, not exactly, because one of the changes they don't want is:
One would allow forfeiture only if there is a criminal conviction.
So this due process - that pesky 5th Amendment again - doesn't mean a conviction in a trial, it means that the accuser needs to "demonstrate" to the judge that the forfeiture is related to a "crime" that hasn't been tried yet. Not only is the proper term for this "accusation" in plain English, but this is essentially "due process is whatever we say it is," and that's not going to cut it Constitutionally. But it gets better:
What incentive would local police and sheriffs have to invest manpower, resources and time in these operations if they don't receive proceeds to cover their costs?
WHAT? The "incentive" for someone doing a job is their salary and the respect one receives for doing a job well. If they have insufficient resources for this the place to obtain them is the state budget, not the pockets of anyone passing by. And it gets worse:
Even in cases in which the property owner doesn't contest the forfeiture, a judge must still sign off on it.
So what? A person has his or her property taken at the point of a gun as a function of an accusation, not a conviction, and must undergo an expensive and complicated legal process to hope to recover it that may or may not even be granted? Paid for how, by the money that's just been taken?
This is pure sophistry. The Constitution is clear. Law enforcement may not become a means of institutional and personal enrichment. I am astonished that anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of the Constitution could pen such nonsense, much less believe it.
Absolute horse hillary
What a pant load. This is all about protecting a rice bowl.
don’t gut it, abolish it. It’s tyranny pure and simple.
That's just my gut feeling...
The most simple reform of civil asset forfeiture that will help get rid of a lot of the abuses is to transfer all proceeds to the state’s general fund. 100% of the proceeds must go to the general fund. No kickbacks of any kind can accrue to those in charge of enforcing the law. That would include the individual police departments, the cities, and courts.
So you are trying to tell us Civil Asset Forfeiture is a tool to fight crime, e.g., drug dealers, pimps, and assorted low-lifes.
Lots of people would take that as a given.
But some of us civilians like to see numbers, and your op-ed doesn't seem to have any.
That worries me.
How about, to bolster your argument that law enforcement should be reimbursed for all their work on investigation, arrest of suspects and subsequent presenting of evidence of a crime to the DA--which are functions historically funded by the taxes we all pay--you give us a summary in round figures of what it costs to do a bust, how much cash and property was confiscated for a given period of time, and--most important to those of us who are not criminals--how much is taken from those who are not even charged.
I'm sure those figures are readily available, so how about it?
Strangely, they don’t use this on 99% of the felons in jail or prison, or else we wouldn’t have to pay for such institutions. If everyone incarcerated was guilty, doesn’t that mean their livelihood should be impounded, according to the writer? Yet, we don’t.
I can see locking up assets that are in question, but localities pocket this money and use it, never to return it.
This practice must stop.
I disagree vigorously, I believe the best way to get rid of a Bad Law is to Require Mandatory Strict Enforcement.
All Public Servants and Public Officials suspected of Criminal Wrongdoing shall be subject to 100% Civil Asset Forfeiture forthwith.
When they bust a drug dealer, they take EVERYTHING he owns, without exception, A public Servant, Official or an Officer of the Court is no better and deserve the same.
a simple ballot initiative would suffice to force the issue.
... while the seized vehicle is being intentionally abused and trashed by officers and agents. The I-10 corridor is notorious for innocent out of state travelers being targeted because they're driving a nice vehicle. They're then required to come back to try to regain their property, which is being used and abused, typically by undercover officers, while supposedly impounded. Vehicles have even been seized in speed traps. This isn't just Alabama, though. Other states are worse.
“Requiring criminal convictions would result in more criminal charges filed and more people going to prison for lesser crimes. Consider pretrial diversion programs, such as drug court, for example. These programs allow people arrested for nonviolent crimes, including some drug charges, to go into treatment and other programs that keep them out of prison. Participants in these programs are not convicted of a crime, so under the proposed change, the only way to deprive them of their ill-gotten gains would be to prosecute them.”
Clearly they are admitting, in that statement, the real purpose of civil asset forfeiture is to seize assets from which the local police can get money for themselves with sales/auctions of seized assets. So, instead of getting first time offenders into treatment programs - which may be the best thing to do - they’ll seek a criminal conviction just so they can seize some assets.
“Meanwhile, sending the proceeds of forfeiture to the state’s General Fund would result in fewer busts of drug and stolen property rings. What incentive would local police and sheriffs have to invest manpower, resources and time in these operations if they don’t receive proceeds to cover their costs? “
Criminal justice SHOULD BE funded by general revenues, not by local entities creating their own corrupt funding mechanisms, turning “justice” into nothing more than how local law enforcement, prosecutors and judges can extract their own funds by seizing people’s assets - people not even convicted of a crime.