Posted on 12/16/2001 8:38:40 AM PST by ATOMIC_PUNK
Government Property Seizures out of Control
Ms. Hylton completely documented where she had gotten the money and was never charged with a crime. But the police kept her money anyway. Destitute, she had no way to fight them. (3) These outrageous seizures are completely legal and have been upheld by the highest courts in the land, including the U.S. Supreme Court. The DEA's Web site claims, "Property is seized by the DEA only when it is determined to be a tool for, or the proceeds of, illegal activities such as drug trafficking, organized crime, or money laundering." But the above examples show the reality. Under civil asset forfeiture, your property – not you – is charged with a crime. Hence the bizarre title of civil forfeiture cases: "United States vs. one 1998 Mercedes Benz," "California vs. 1711 Main Street," and so forth. Once your property is charged with a crime, it can be seized and kept by police, even if you are never convicted of anything. An appeals court in Florida even ruled that police can personally receive bounties of 25 percent of the value of anything they seize from you, such as your car, bank accounts or home. There are now more than 400 federal offenses and thousands of state and local offenses for which your cash, car, bank accounts and home can be seized – including shoplifting, hiring an illegal alien such as a maid (California), playing a car stereo too loud (New York), transporting illegal fireworks, gambling, having illegal drugs on your property, and merely discussing violating any law ("conspiracy”), such as underpaying your taxes. More than $1 billion in property is now seized without trial each year from innocent Americans, according to the national forfeiture defense organization FEAR (Forfeiture Endangers American Rights) (4). Seizures range from the pocket cash of poor street people to the cars of men accused of soliciting prostitutes to multimillion-dollar apartment buildings. Once police seize your property, the burden of proof is on you to prove your property’s innocence. Any suspected illegal actions of your relatives, guests, friends and employees on or even near your property are sufficient grounds to seize it. In Montgomery, Ala., police seized the home of 69-year-old Gussie Mae Gantt after videotaping police informants buying drugs in her yard. Ms. Gantt had previously called the police, complaining about drug dealing in her neighborhood, and had posted no-trespassing signs, but the drug dealers ignored them. Police waited until there was a drug deal in her yard and then seized her home. (5)
Easy Money for the Government Once your home, car or bank accounts are seized under civil asset forfeiture laws, you can pretty much forget about ever getting them back. It's you versus the police and courts, who divide up the proceeds from your property according to formulas such as "80 percent for police, 20 percent for the court." If you want to fight seizure of your property, expect to spend at least $15,000 just to hire a competent asset defense attorney. Also expect the police to introduce hearsay evidence and to go through trial after trial, because the normal constitutional protections afforded criminal suspects don't apply to civil forfeiture of your property. (6) With all of this easy confiscated money, asset confiscation is now big business across America. In Volusia County, Fla., police seized more than $8 million worth of cars from motorists stopped for minor traffic violations along Interstate 95. (7) In Alameda County, Calif., police auction off hundreds of seized cars and boats every month. The latest wrinkle in civil asset forfeiture is police working with Amtrak, Greyhound, airlines and hotels to seize cash from travelers. The Albuquerque Journal reports that Amtrak gave the Drug Enforcement Administration access to its booking system in exchange for 10 percent of any monies seized by police. The DEA has similar deals with airlines at major airports and many hotel and motel owners in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and other large cities. DEA agents are now permanently stationed at major airports and hotels. So, the next time you pay for an Amtrak ticket, airline flight or hotel room in cash, don’t be surprised if you get a knock on your door from machine gun-armed DEA agents. Sources: (1) "Railway Bandits," Reason, July 2001, p. 14. (2) "Railway Bandits," Reason, July 2001, p. 15. (3) "Presumed Guilty: The Law's Victims in the War on Drugs," Andrew Schneider and Mary Pat Flaherty. Reprinted from the Pittsburgh Press, Aug. 11-16, 1991, pp. 5-6. (4) Forfeiture Endangers American Rights, www.fear.org. (5) An analysis of U.S. asset forfeiture laws, with extensive legal citations, can be found in the book "Your House Is Under Arrest," by Brenda Grantland, one of America's leading asset defense attorneys. Copies are available from ISIL, 707/726-8796, www.isil.org. Another excellent source is "Forfeiting Our Property Rights," by U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill. (6) Brenda Grantland, "Your House Is Under Arrest," Institute for the Preservation of Wealth, Burnsville, Minn., 1993, p. 61.
(7) Orlando Sentinel, Aug. 2, 1992.Jarret Wollstein
Across America, the Drug Enforcement Administration is seizing the luggage, cash and cars of hapless travelers. Under America's new civil forfeiture laws, mere possession of a large amount of cash or a drug dog barking at your luggage is sufficient probable cause for police to legally seize everything you are carrying.
Saturday, June 30, 2001
Sometimes victims possess no drugs at all. Just ask the family of Annie Rae Dixon, an 84-year-old grandmother shot and killed during a 2 a.m. drug raid of her east Texas home in 1992. No drugs were ever found on the premises. One officer later hypothesized that his pistol accidentally discharged when he kicked open Dixon’s bedroom door. “[I] started throwing my guts up crying because I knew I had shot somebody that didn’t have no reason to be shot,” he said.4
No less vicious was the 1998 shooting death of Pedro Oregon Navarro by Houston police. Six officers stormed his home at 1:40 a.m. in a military-style raid after a man arrested for public drunkenness said Navarro was a drug dealer. Agents shot the bleary-eyed Navarro 12 times, killing him. A search of his residence produced no illicit drugs or weapons.5
California rancher Donald Scott, 61, met a similar fate in 1992, when a team of local and federal agents burst into his mansion during a midnight raid, ostensibly to search for marijuana. When Scott reached for a pistol to defend himself, he was shot dead. An investigation by the Ventura County district attorney later revealed that the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department had fabricated evidence that Scott was cultivating pot because it hoped to seize his property, which was adjacent to a federal park.6 Ventura County officials eventually agreed to pay the Scott family $4 million in damages; the federal government agreed to pay $1 million.
More recently, a SWAT team from El Monte, California, raided a home in neighboring Compton on the evening of August 9, 1999, killing retired grandfather Mario Paz by shooting him twice in the back. Police executing the search warrant said they believed the house was sometimes used as a mail drop by a local drug dealer.8 Although police found no drugs and filed no charges against any of the surviving family members, they refused to return an estimated $11,000 dollars seized during the deadly raid.9
Some victims are the victims of sheer error. Take the September 29, 1999, assault by Denver SWAT agents on the home of Ismael Mena. Mena, a 45-year-old father of nine, was shot eight times and killed by police in the unannounced raid. No drugs were found, and police now speculate that they may have had an incorrect address.10
An equally vicious police blunder claimed the life of Reverend Accelyne Williams, a 75-year-old retired Methodist minister who suffered a fatal heart attack when Boston police broke into his apartment on March 24, 1994. Acting on false information provided by a confidential informant, anti-drug agents chased Williams to his bedroom, shoved him to the floor, and pointed guns at his head-inducing the heart attack that killed him. Boston Police Commissioner Paul Evans later admitted at a press conference that police likely raided the wrong apartment. “If that is the case, then there will be an apology,” he said.11 Two years later, the city paid a $1 million settlement to Williams’s widow.12
I am calmly awaiting for the "we do it for YOUR own good" crowd to show up and explain all of this away.
great post.
In one incident near the central coast of California officers invaded a home in the middle of the night and executed an elderly man in front of his wife. His only crime was that he was sleeping and startled by intruders may have armed himself. There was no justifiable cause to for the raid. There was no crime. The theory is that the department simply wanted the land, or a portion of the cash value of that land expected if they could justify forfeiture.
These property seizures are out of control.
These seizures are NOT legal. It's past time for the Supreme Court to get off their butts and do their job. The current seizure law is UNCONSTITUTIONAL, and law enforcement who enforce this law are committing crimes under color of law.
See how the community relates to the police in Mexico for a preview of how life in America will be in a few years.
Come on... power flows from the barrel of a gun and who has the guns? The gov't is completely out of control and entirely unaccountable for their actions. Remember them burning a church down and machine-gunning women and children trying to escape the flames on live TV(Waco)? If we didn't do anything then we sure ain't going to do anything about a few hundred thousand isolated instances of gov't theft of personal property every year.
Remember, you can go to prison for selling your own urine now. Just be thankful they're not putting a bullet in your head for your subversive post (yet).
Amendment IV- The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Amendment V- No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Maybe someone with more time (legal knowledge) than I could lend some insight.
Just listen to the cries of outrage in the media and in the schools, churches, homes, work-places, and super markets of this "freedom-loving" Nation.
Are you listening?
Are you?
[/Sarcasm]
so no writs, no jury trials, court appointed attorneys, no double jepardy protection, because they have managed to seperate property from it's owner and make them eligible for different treatment under the law
neat trick, huh?
Too bad we have all those liberals on the Supreme Court who have voted with the majority to seige innocent people's hard earned money.
How on earth could you even imply that a NewsMax story would not address both sides of an issue?
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