Posted on 11/09/2022 3:15:29 PM PST by nickcarraway
California police seized more than $17,000 from Vera and Apollonia Ward and accused them of laundering drug money, all without charging them with a crime. The two sisters were trying to start a dog-breeding business.
Vera and Apollonia Ward, two sisters from Virginia, were just getting a dog-breeding business off the ground last year when they encountered an unusual setback: The police accused them of laundering drug money and seized more than $17,000 from them.
The Ward sisters were never charged with a crime, though. They had run afoul of civil asset forfeiture, which allows police to seize property suspected of being connected to criminal activity, even if the owner is never charged or convicted of a crime.
Law enforcement groups say civil forfeiture is a vital tool to disrupt drug trafficking and criminal networks by targeting their illicit revenues. However, civil liberties groups, news outlets, and a broad range of advocacy groups have published numerous reports showing that asset forfeiture lacks due process protections and often targets everyday people rather than cartel lords.
One of those groups, Arizona's Goldwater Institute, a public interest law firm, ended up taking on the Ward sisters' case. The Goldwater Institute recently released a short video on the sisters' ordeal:
Before last year, though, the Ward sisters, like many people, had never heard of civil forfeiture. They had started a business breeding American Bullies. They said they had a very successful first litter and were looking to buy two more dogs for breeding. Last November, they tried to send $17,500 in cash through FedEx to a middleman in California, essentially a dog broker, to scout and purchase two new animals for them.
They said they received an unusual call several days later from someone claiming to be at a FedEx facility, who they later learned was a police officer. The person on the phone asked if there was anything in the package he should know about. No, they said, just the cash.
In follow-up calls, it became clear that they weren't dealing with FedEx customer service but rather the San Joaquin County Sheriff's Office, which suspected the cash was drug proceeds. It became clear that the police were neither letting the cash go to its destination nor sending it back to the Wards.
"They said they smelled marijuana on the money," Vera Ward says. "We don't smoke. It's not plausible since my sister and I aren't around it."
Not to mention the sisters say they had pulled the money out of the bank several days before they sent it and had receipts to back up their claim.
"We had proof, and they were like, 'No you don't, that's drug money,'" Vera Ward remembers. When the sisters refused to cave and say the money was drug proceeds, they say officers threatened to go after them for money laundering.
When the sisters still refused to admit any connection to drug dealing, the San Joaquin County Sheriff's Office seized the money anyway, and the San Joaquin District Attorney's Office moved to forfeit it under California's civil forfeiture laws.
Worries About Inflation Didn't Stop Voters From Approving Minimum Wage Increases More than half of U.S. states have passed reforms to their civil asset forfeiture laws over the past decade, requiring convictions before property can be forfeited and raising the standard of evidence in forfeiture cases. However, cases like the Wards' still pop up frequently, especially when it comes to cash being moved through airports and along highways, even though traveling domestically with large amounts of cash is perfectly legal.
"Doing research, we found out that [civil forfeiture] was common, especially for innocent people," Vera Ward says, "but it seemed like [police] had the upper hand."
The sizeable amount of cash made it worthwhile for the Wards to find lawyers and fight the seizure. In many smaller cash seizures, the cost of hiring an attorney would make the returns negligible or even a net negative.
After the Wards connected with the Goldwater Institute, prosecutors relented and returned the sisters' money. Still, law enforcement held their cash for six months on accusations that weren't supported by evidence. The delay set their business back, and it decreased their trust in the police, who they say were rude and unprofessional.
"It was a very disheartening and offensive ordeal we had to go through," Apollonia Ward says. "We had to prove we weren't criminals. We had to go through a lot of back and forth, and our lawyers had to stay on top of them to get them to do everything right."
The bigger REAL issue is paying cash for a service or product; possibly to avoid paying taxes on the income. They could have written a check for $17,000, or done a wire transfer.
I’ve never heard of sending that much cash by FedEx.
So they were looking for American Bullies and found them.
“they tried to send $17,500 in cash through FedEx”
There’s a reason we invented money orders and cashier’s checks people.
Not to say that we don’t need to reform the asset forfeiture laws, but still, even if the cops didn’t take the money it’s still extremely stupid to send 17 grand in cash via the mail.
And some people wonder why LEOs are so hated across the country. A few dirty cops is all it takes to tarnish the rest.
You would think the Honest LEOs would stop this. Hell, they too are enjoying the fruits of the dirty and figure why mess with a good thing. Corruption runs deep.
Ex-squeeze me? Does this seem really stupid to anyone else?
It needs to stop.
It’s completely wrong.
Maybe it’s just me, but I think anyone who sends $17,500 in cash via FedEx is a moron. In addition to the obvious risk of theft, this raises all kinds of red flags that put a business owner on the radar screen of various government agencies.
We open the borders for drug cartels, then we treat the citizens as criminals.
They were breeding them for dogfights, that’s my guess.
Yeah; I was wondering why they were paying in cash that could be ‘smelled’ in the first place.
Not a good business practice.
They were stupid to send cash through the mail. But being stupid is not a crime. I hope they get their money back.
I remember hearing in the 80’s-90’s that cocaine was detected on pretty much all paper money as people would roll it up to use as a straw.
I was in NYC with my family a couple of weeks ago and I swear you can’t walk around without smelling pot smoke at virtually all times. Everywhere we went. Cops saying you’re a drug dealer because they smell a legal substance that everyone seems to be smoking everywhere in big cities just doesn’t hold water.
I got myself involved during a domestic flight. I thought our jetliner was going to be hijacked, so passed a note to the pilot. When we landed, the perp was detained in front of me. I later heard from flight attendents that drugs were exchanged for cash, and the perp had taped $40,000 to his body. This was in the late 1980s.
The cash was confiscated as a civil forfeiture, and the case went to trial a year later. The line of questioning to me (by Public Defenders) developed that I was not an expert in hijacking, so the cash should be returned to the perp, who spoke only Spanish.
The cash was ultimately returned to the perp, and presumably, his Cartel.
Recall what Christ said to the soldiers who asked Him how they should live?
“And he said unto them, Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages.”
This hellish doctrine of civil asset forfeiture lets the police do exactly these things at the expense of thpse they claim to be protecting.
All for calling the Sheriff when he found illegal activity on his property. The “forfeiture” laws need to be changed, much like the sovereign immunity laws which allow government employees to violate citizens’ rights, without any repercussions.
I would have a lot more sympathy for them, and more faith in their innocence, if they weren’t breeding American Bullies, the breed choice of drug thugs, the dog that eats little children for breakfast.
That said, civil forfeiture is a unconstitutional and deeply corrupting, and I’m glad they got their money back, and I wish they would breed Yorkies instead.
The owner of a bunch of bikini barista coffee stands was busted for tax evasion after they tried to deposit a bunch of cash that smelled like fish.
If I remember correctly the local pd got in on the investigation and all their undercover officers frequented all these stands daily for a year.
They justified it as a prostitution investigation because they said a confidential informant told them that some of the baristas had offered them sex.
Someone Email: Steve@lehtoslaw.com
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