Suitcases Full of Cash On Plane (New Mexico)

ABQ journal ^ | 12/5/03

[WackyKat]

Do you get the feeling they train these dogs to sniff out money just so they can say it is drug money?

It has been proven that almost all currency has at least traces of illegal drugs on it

There is little doubt that we all have carried around money that has been in the pocket of a crack dealer at some point.

So if you have what the cops decide is "too much cash" they just call it drug money

[Ramius]

Cute, but oxycontin doesn't cost that much.

[xrp]

Coroner started on Feb 6, 2003. ZOTTTTTTT!!!

[CindyDawg]

It reminds me of that guy who was arrested for drugs and won a lottery ticket. They took it away because he had no income so it was concluded that he bought it with drug money. A dollar!

[Ramius]

It has been proven that almost all currency has at least traces of illegal drugs on it

It might be a fun idea, but there isn't enough on ordinary bills to make a drug sniffing dog alert.

[Terry Mross]

Here's something you might try. Buy a roundtrip ticket anywhere leaving and returning as soon as possible. Let's assume you buy a ticket from Houston to Nashville with a three hour stay in Nashville then right back to Houston. I promise a federal agent of some sort will approach you at the airport and ask you if you have a large sum of money. And if you have $5,000 or more in cash say goodbye to your money. That's what America has bome to. Suspicion is cause enough to confiscate your stuff.

[Cicero]

It was some perfectly innocent spare cash I had in a suitcase that went astray yesterday. I want it back.

[Ramius]

Woah... that happens to me all the time. Now I guess I know why.

Don't get me wrong... I'm the in the "no" WOD camp. But that doesn't mean I have to have sympathy for the cartel crowd.

[piasa]

In this case the authorites didn't check into the two because there was cash involved. They checked into the two because the company alerted them that there was a private plane being flown by a pilot who didn't seem to be aware of what his passenger's name is.

If you don't see anything suspicious about a pilot who flies cross country with one passenger yet doesn't even know the guy's name, carrying a suitcase which doesn't- according to the pilot and passenger- belong to them, then you wouldn't see anything suspicious about an Arab inquiring into flight lessons but not showing any interest in landing procedures.

And a simple check confirmed the passenger is an illegal. I'd say the authorities had pretty good reason to be suspicious.

And this is BEFORE the suitcase was found to have cash in it.

This is hardly a case of 'just the cash' being the trigger for an investigation, though with planes, cash and illegals involved this could as easily be a terrorist case as a drug case.

[LibWhacker]

Fifty thousand dollars in $20 bills . . .

Darnit! That should be: Fifty thousand $20 bills. Is it bedtime? I'm makin' a mistake a minute here. Goodnight all.

[coloradan]

It's not a crime to carry lots of cash.

Tell that to the judge after your cash is confiscated. (Remembering that asset forfeiture is a civil process and not criminal: you lack certain rights and must prove your innocence, while the government has a lower burden of proof.)

Is possession of cash a crime?

[BlazingArizona]

I'm sure that if someone, anyone, would step forward and claim the cash, the Feds would love to speak to them and give them their money.

No, if it's over $10,000 the feds could steal it anyway without due process, unless they were to charge you with a crime. You would have to sue to get it back.

[TexNotMex]

"Another suitcase filled with cellophane-wrapped cash was discovered in the front cargo area."

Sometimes I think they train these dogs to sniff out cellophane not drugs or cash. I guess if you are going to be smuggling drugs or cash, it would be wise to use fresh cellophane/plastic bags, not something that you had your ham sandwich in earlier. On an unrelated note, just recently, along the US-Mexico border, 80 lbs. of illegal bolonga was seized. I bet that dog pissed himself when he found that. Thats probably the biggest illegal bolonga seizure this year. I guess customs hit the mother-load.

[Spunky]

There was an article not to long ago about a truck being stopped and it was full of millions of dollars.

I wonder if it could be money coming in to fund terrorist cells here in the U.S.

[VeniVidiVici]

No, if it's over $10,000 the feds could steal it anyway without due process, unless they were to charge you with a crime. You would have to sue to get it back.

Ah, but you see then we would be reading a different story. :-)

An innocent person would scream bloody murder that the cops are stealing their money under asset forfeiture laws. And, then, if the guy is Jamaican as mentioned in the story? Profiling would get thrown around, "flying while black" would be bantied about the liberal press, etc.

Fortunately, for the feds, this money isn't owned by anybody.

[WackyKat]

It has been proven that almost all currency has at least traces of illegal drugs on it

It might be a fun idea, but there isn't enough on ordinary bills to make a drug sniffing dog alert.

That explains the failure of my attempts to get high by licking my money.

[arasina]

Kamlesh Rana? Yuri Folks?

[Hegemony Cricket]

I admit it, it's mine. Let's talk.

[I'll be your Huckleberry]

But scientists say the test the police rely on is no test at all because drugs contaminate virtually all the currency in America.

Over a seven-year period, Dr. Jay Poupko and his colleagues at Toxicology Consultants Inc. in Miami have repeatedly tested currency in Austin, Dallas, Los Angeles, Memphis, Miami, Milwaukee, New York City, Pittsburgh, Seattle and Syracuse. He also tested American bills in London.

"An average of 96 percent of all the bills we analyzed from the 11 cities tested positive for cocaine. I don't think any rational thinking person can dispute that almost all the currency in this country is tainted with drugs," Poupko says.

Scientists at National Medical Services, in Willow Grove, Pa., who tested money from banks and other legal sources more than a dozen times, consistently found cocaine on more than 80 percent of the bills.

"Cocaine is very adhesive and easily transferable," says Vincent Cordova, director of criminalistics for the private lab. "A police officer, pharmacist, toxicologist or anyone else who handles cocaine, including drug traffickers, can shake hands with someone, who eventually touches money, and the contamination process begins."

Cordova and other scientists use gas chromatography and mass spectroscopy, precise alcohol washes and a dozen other sophisticated techniques to identify the presence of narcotics down to the nanogram level one billionth of a gram. That measure, which is far less than a pin point, is the same level a dog can detect with a sniff.

What a drug dog cannot do, which the scientists can, is quantify the amount of drugs on the bills.

Half of the money Cordova examined had levels of cocaine at or above 9 nanograms. This level means the bills were either near a source of cocaine or were handled by someone who touched the drug, he says.

Another 30 percent of the bills he examined show levels below 9 nanograms, which indicates "the bills were probably in a cash drawer, wallet or some place where they came in contact with money previously contaminated."

The lab's research found $20 bills are most highly contaminated, with $10 and $5 bills next. The $1, $50 and $100 bill usually have the lowest cocaine levels.

And what happens to the mountain of "drug-contaminated" dollars the government seizes each year? The bills aren't burned, cleaned, or stored in a well-guarded warehouse.

Twenty-one seizing agencies questioned all said the tainted money was deposited in a local bank - which means it's back in circulation.

[NewRomeTacitus]

Beat me to that amazing fact, Doc Holliday. Good work.

What's the big mystery? Just another load of cash from George Soros on its way to a "progressive" Democratic politician. "Nothing to see here...move along."