Free Republic

One of government’s most shocking powers is civil asset forfeiture or seizure. This power occurs when law enforcement confiscates private property with or without charging the owner with a crime. In Tennessee, the betting odds say it is more likely personal property will be taken by law enforcement than through a robbery. Scary, isn't it? Going back slightly more than a decade you will find Tennessee law enforcement has taken more than $150 million in cash and personal property – without criminal charges or legal accusations of criminal activity. The proceeds from these types of seizures are generally applied to...

People who are freed from prison when their convictions are reversed deserve a refund of what they paid in fees, court costs and restitution, the Supreme Court ruled Wednesday. “They are entitled to be presumed innocent” once their convictions are thrown out, said Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and the state “has zero claim” to their money. {snip} Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. agreed with the outcome in the Colorado case, but said it was “unnecessary for the court to issue a sweeping pronouncement on restitution.” The court noted that new Justice Neil M. Gorsuch took no part in the case.

 Structuring Violations Laws (Assets Seizure for Consistently 'Suspicious' Deposits Just Below $10k) Were Originally Passed Because Professional Credit-Card-Fraud Organized Crime Is Nearly Impossible To Break.  A "Mule" for a top money laundering operation was only caught because a substitute check-cashing clerk he had romanced found him making $2,995 transactions in two different cities.   I made a "top secret" movie of a lecture before a Veterans' group, "I'd tell you a secret, but then I'd have to kill you" sort of thing, the lecture title was "The Transnational Impact of Financial Crimes", basically it was a law-enforcement insider's account of how...

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. on Friday barred local and state police from using federal law to seize cash, cars and other property without evidence that a crime occurred. Holder’s action represents the most sweeping check on police power to confiscate personal property since the seizures began three decades ago as part of the war on drugs.

IN the late 1980s, an elderly blind widow in Arlington frustrated the city's plans for a grand shopping mall. She refused to surrender the small plot of land where she had lived for decades, choosing to live out her days in the familiar surroundings of her wood-frame house. The mall was built around her property, her faded white home jutting into its parking lot. She held out for years. After she died, developers bought the property and paved it over, melding it into the glaring sameness of suburban retail like the last reluctant piece of a jigsaw puzzle. In light...

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - Shocked at a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allows cities to raze homes so developers can build private hotels, malls and office parks on the land, state lawmakers called for legislation to ban the practice Friday. The high court split 5-4 in a Connecticut case Thursday that under the Fifth Amendment, municipalities could take private property for private development because the project in question met a public purpose: creating jobs and revenue. But in an impassioned dissent, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote that the court majority had forsaken the middle class and gutted the American principle...

IRS sends 600,000 to area agencies Cash is their share of funds taken from money-laundering efforts Copyright 2003 Caller-Times Publishing Company September 9, 2003, Tuesday The Internal Revenue Service handed out more than $600,000 from cash seizures to area law enforcement agencies Monday. The money was seized from drug dealers' money-laundering efforts. The IRS got involved as one of the principals of the South Texas Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Task Force. The IRS's Criminal Investigation office gave $75,000 to the Live Oak County Sheriff's Office, $204,000 to the Kleberg County Sheriff's Office, $245,000 to the George West Police Department...

Man arrested for allegedly plotting to blow up federal buildings, including Denver City and County Building updated: March 08, 2003 - 4:47 PM Written By: Web Producer Jeannie Piper DENVER – Federal and local authorities announced Friday the arrest of a 51-year-old man accused of trying to buy explosives and recruit inmates to blow up government facilities, including at least one building in Denver. Authorities say the biggest local target was the Denver City and County Building. According to a court affidavit, Dana West was apparently recruiting prisoners to help him carry out his plot. It says he tried to...

Allowing Cops To Keep Seized Loot is Unconstitutional New Jersey's practice of letting police and prosecutors keep the money and assets they seize is unconstitutional, a judge said in a case that could affect other states. The ruling, issued by Superior Court Judge Thomas G. Bowen in Salem County, puts a halt, for now, to a system criticized as bounty hunting. The practice gives law enforcement a stake in the cash, cars, computers and other property seized from criminals and suspects. "The decision will ensure that police and prosecutors make decisions on the basis of justice, not on the potential...