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Justice Department Shuts Down Huge Asset Forfeiture Program
HughPickens.com writes: Christopher Ingraham reports at the Washington Post that the Department of Justice has announced that it's suspending a controversial asset forfeiture program that allows local police departments to keep a large portion of assets seized from citizens under federal law and funnel it into their own coffers. Asset forfeiture has become an increasingly contentious practice in recent years. It lets police seize and keep cash and property from people who are never convicted — and in many cases, never charged with wrongdoing. Recent reports have found that the use of the practice has exploded in recent years, prompting concern that, in some cases, police are motivated more by profits and less by justice. Criminal justice reformers are cheering the change. "This is a significant deal," says Lee McGrath, legislative counsel at the Institute for Justice. "Local law enforcement responds to incentives. And it's clear that one of the biggest incentives is the relative payout from federal versus state forfeiture. And this announcement by the DOJ changes the playing field for which law state and local [law enforcement] is going to prefer."
When the government steals they give it a nice sounding euphemism. When citizens steal they're called criminals and go to jail.
Now give the ill gotten gains back
From TFA:
the Department of Justice Asset Forfeiture Program announced that it would defer all equitable sharing payments for forfeitures, both civil and criminal, to state, local, and tribal partners for the foreseeable future.
They are still taking the money. Just not sharing it with local law enforcement.
Have gnu, will travel.
Bottom line these "assets" are often the most reliable source of hard cash banks have available nowadays. As with most public policy actions in this era, the needs and wants of the financial sector take precedence even over the the fondest police state measures.
the feds want more of that portion. locals get less.
i find it quite distressing that this was ever considered legal.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
It's just a violation of the 4th and 8th Amendments. After all, the Constitution doesn't mean anything, we can have a Federal Government willfully trample all over it whenever it likes...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
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. - US Constitution, 4th Amendment
Asset seizures and forfeiture, especially without charges or conviction, are inherently unconstitutional. Of course, when Government gets to arbitrate what is Constitutional, it will naturally decide that a nice, open-ended income stream will always be constitutional - regardless of the actual fact.
If only more people remembered our rights existed before the Government was founded, our rights do not come from Government.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Asset forfeiture has become a program by which law enforcement can shake down citizens without and evidentiary standard, and steal that money for their own departments.
I'm sorry, but can you trust law enforcement when they profit from the misapplication of terrible laws?
For me, no way in hell ... it became a license to steal money like a bunch of crooks. And like a bunch of crooks, they stole everything which wasn't nailed down.
I bet the sheer amount of money which has essentially been stolen by a bunch of thugs with badges is vast. I mean, why wouldn't they steal money from every schmuck they encountered if they could just make shit up and claim they suspected a crime.
You want to see how corruptable police are? Give them free reign to take money without a court to decide, and you'll see exactly what we have now ... a fucking shakedown racket the mob would be proud of.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Thanks a lot, Obama.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I don't like the guy, but draining him in the way they have is terrible.
Great book on growth and abuse of police powers
"Are cops constitutional?
Any hypothetical world where police were ruled unconstitutional would descend into chaos, probably rather quickly.
But Legal scholar and civil liberties activist Roger Roots posed just that question. Roots, a fairly radical libertarian, believes that the US Constitution does not allow for police as they exist today. He says police departments, powers, and practices today violate the Constitution's spirit and intent because ''Under the criminal justice model known to the Framers, professional police officers were unknown,' Roots writes. The general public had broad law enforcement powers, and only the executive functions of the law (ex. the execution of writs, warrants, and orders) were performed by constables or sheriff who might call upon the community for assistance. Initiation and investigation of criminal cases was nearly the exclusive province of private persons The advent of modern policing has greatly altered the balance of power between the citizen and the state in a way that would have been seen as constitutionally invalid by the Founders.''
http://www.amazon.com/Rise-War...
LA Police get cartoon LA Times critic fired http://www.theguardian.com/boo... http://cartoonistsrights.org/d... http://www.mintpressnews.com/l...
Not really. America is a shitty country. Police stealing from citizens. Doesn't seem like it should be possible in a modern democracy. Imagine having your money or property taken, without you being convicted of a crime, or even charged. The United States is permanently erased from my list of possible places to travel to. And nothing of value was lost.
This is a quote from the Washington Post article:
I read this to mean that their budgets are predicated on a certain ammount of civil forteiture, which is as wrong as wrong could be. Especially if the 'never convicted, never charged' statistics are as high as claimed.
Just call it what is was: Legalized Theft, backed by the power of law.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
So they'll probably start stealing more.
Looks like the local police unions didn't pay enough bribes to the federal police unions. :(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... Does a good job of explaining and showing the police corruption related to this.
the feds want more of that portion. locals get less.
That'll put an end to it. The locals are the ones collecting the money, and many states have removed their own civil forfeiture laws leaving LEOs [sic] to go through the feds to get the money. When it quits paying they'll stop as it's not worth the effort.
Do you have ESP?
My question is, how in heaven's name can the courts tolerate this? By what twisted reasoning can such an obvious travesty upon the Constitution be allowed to stand? Surely at least one case has come before a court in which the judge ruled that the assets must be returned within 20 minutes or the sheriff has to lock himself up for contempt?
The Judicial branch of government has proved itself completely useless and devoid of a spine. All three branches of government are revealed as thieving despots. Civil forfeiture is only one item of evidence in this assertion. It makes the population lose all respect for the law. Every man for himself, and devil take the hindmost. For shame, judges and other officers of the court!
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
The U.S. government has a higher percentage of its citizens in prison than any country in the history of the world. (The rate of 707 prisoners per 100,000 population is artificially reduced because of all the exclusions.)
Part of the reason the prison rate is so high is that, in the U.S., prisons are a very profitable business, with little oversight and plenty of chances to be abusive. For some detail, see Matt Taibbi's book, The Divide.
Other issues: The financial system. Health care. Military, such as the invasion of Iraq, which destroyed Iraqi society. The U.S. government has killed an estimated 11,000,000 people since the end of World War 2. Why? Partly because military action is profitable to contractors.
This was the link I was looking for. John Oliver's take on the subject of civil forfeiture is funny but poignant. "Its not you that stands trial, its your stuff!" If I had some mod points I would give them to kbsoftware.... Cheers.
The obvious is going to happen once you start forcing the people who make the seizures to earn their living from it no matter how honest 99% of them are.
The DMCA, the patriot act, pretty much any law in response to child porn, COPPA, etc. All crap that should never have passed as written because of the overreach that was inevitable.
Laws really need some kind of *too vague* review by the public where the public is asked to think of every possible way to undermine the law and then account for it. Laws like civil forfeiture should only ever have been used against proceeds of crime (shell companies of money laundering, and dimwits taking 10000$+ across the border.)
Government(& to some extent Business) is one thing:
A MINORITY imposing their WILL on a MAJORITY.
If you're not one of "Them" then you are shit. And just like Gangs, people are pushed out of their little "Minority" all the time.
Government & police in the US are flat out Corrupt. They know it & they don't care. Just like Organized Religion. They do what they want, but pass judgement on those whom they "oversee".
I learned a long time ago you can't fight the system. Because the system will always win, whether it is right or wrong(cause even if you will you've lost). just look at people in jail for being behind on Child Support - and debtor's prisons are supposed to be outlawed in the US.
The Feds were doing that before and are stopping some things now.
Dumbed down enough?
Once you grasp that we can start discussing if they are doing enough or not instead of a mindless rant.
Of course it should never happened in the first place, but that's a bit different to pretending there's no effort at correction whether it's a cosmetic band-aid or something real.
There are two main reasons that line of thinking can't work, the plain languages of the Constitution and logic.
The Bill of Rights is mostly a list of things the government "shall not infringe", things the government can not do. The government may shall not infringe THE right of ______, the right of _______, etc. It's a list of things the government can't mess with, so obviously the government didn't create them. Note also the Constitution says "THE right of", not "A (newly created) right of". The language is plain that the right existed before the Constitution was written, and before the government existed. Our federal government could not have created something before the fedral government existed, therefore rights cannot have been created by the government any more than you could have created your own grandparents.
Further, consider what a right is, the definition of the word. If the right to free speech meant that you could say what the government (or the majority) wants you to say, that would be no right at all. What makes it a right, the very definition of a right, is that it cannot be taken away (only violated), neither by the government not by the majority aka social contract. If the government gave you your rights, they could legitimately take them away. Since the government can only violate or protect your rights, not remove them (by definition) , the rights cannot have been created or granted by government. They must be a intrinsic property of the dignity of man.
You Americans really need to change your laws so John Oliver can be President. He talked about this last year.
That's so true. The government couldn't interfere with you tar and feathering your neighbour for his speech, or in the case of Mr Lynch, hanging them. The government couldn't interfere with your right to buy people and infringe on their rights. The government would actually help you steal other peoples property as those savages weren't actually people so you had a right to their stuff.
Obviously for the entitled, rights pre-existed, including the right to infringe on others rights, but only as private citizens instead of the traditional aristocracy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
It's just a violation of the 4th and 8th Amendments. After all, the Constitution doesn't mean anything, we can have a Federal Government willfully trample all over it whenever it likes...
That's the trouble with "living documents". Like any other lifeform, they have to eat. Apparently, what the "living constitution" eats is rights.
= = = =
(Or you could argue that it's really a problem with government schools. As far back as the '50s, when I was subjected to them, the section of the civics book on the constitution actually claimed it could be amended by "customs and usage".)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Comment removed based on user account deletion
or how bout the cops?
People who facilitated this need to be fired and or hauled off to jail.
Do you have some relevant point you're trying to make? If so, please state it plainly and we can see if it a) makes sense and b) is relevant to this discussion. My best guess is that you're trying to find a cute way of saying one of the following:
Sometimes people do bad things.
Often governments infringe rights that than protect them.
Both are obviously true. And?
Where the worst offenders belong to the law enforcement community. The plain truth of the matter is that if you need help, calling a cop should be your last resort.
...as part of your "person, papers, and effects." It's the "living document" that applies the 2nd Amendment to your Bushmaster as well as your musket. But Libertarian wankers overly impressed with themselves have a hard time seeing that, since it's the past the tips of their noses and all...
So this is basically just theft. The police are just like the Crips and Bloods, except they're taxpayer funded.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Did I see this same story about 6 months ago? I remember it because there are so few things the Obama administration does that are good so it really stuck out. It is good to have a reminder though. It's nice to be reminded that this administration can do a good thing.
I often don't like the choices people make, but I like the fact that people make choices. That's why I'm a conservative.
Asset forfeiture isn't over. So who do the proceeds go to now? Answer: the same people who just clawed back this power from local police. The bigger crooks have just robbed the smaller crooks. Democracy lol.
I recalled a story about some John in the Detroit area getting busted in an anti-prostitution sting, driving his wife's car, and the police seizing the vehicle. This is purely unjust enrichment of those police departments.
Here's some more...
http://articles.latimes.com/20...
Just another day in Paradise
Its absurd that police forces should even get a commission for seizing assets.
SURELY NOT!!!!!
Assume you have 50k in your car. Cop stops you and "takes it". Options are: 1. Give up and the 50k is gone. You lose. 2. Fight in court were legal fees and time lost will surpass the original 50k. You lose. 3. Fight the cop and get killed/go to jail. You lose. 4. Kill the cop. You will be hunted down and either killed or jailed. You lose. There isnt one scenario in which a citizen has a successful ending. So a citizen who interacts with a cop in this situation always loses. I am honestly surprised more scenario 4s havent occured.
You mean like how the term 'papers' should absolutely include anything on computers or in cars because that's our modern day 'papers and effects'? The literalists let the statists get away with their screwed up interpretations of things to the cost of all our inherent rights.
So, I'm reading this story, and reading the comments. Everyone's piling on the "Gubmint bad! They steal from us!" bandwagon... Uhm. Guys? This story is the Gubmint STOPPING a horrible practice. Why aren't there more cheers?
The DOJ was right to stop this. They did. Hooray!
Independent Reasons:
* we lack transparent, responsible government for the people by the people
* considering the size of our local population, we cannot expect to be adequately represented by a territorial government as large as the USG; the representative to represented ratio difference is far too large
* the culture of the people demands local governance
Offenses of the standing government against the people:
* for forgetting the founding principles of this nation
* for failure to respect the constitution & the law
* for the constant aggression, manipulation, & violence against foreign sovereign neighbors for the purpose of enriching private interests
* for the use of the draft to force men into roles of said private wars
* for failure to declare war in times of war
* for the maintenance of standing armies in times of peace
* for favoring people with wealth in cases of justice
* for the delegation of control of the people's money supply to private interests
* for the rampant bribing of politicians at all levels
* for the theft of the people's property, by force & inflation, & of the right to use gold and silver
* for allowing monopolies to embed themselves in the market place & stifle innovation
* for the creation of legislation enabling some men to pay an unfair portion of taxes
* for the extension of copyrights & patents to such lengths as to result in less progress & competition & resulting in a theft of public property
* for the absolute invasion of privacy of all men
* for the constant blatant lies & distortion of facts when addressing the people
* for the infringement of the natural rights of man to live & travel in peace
* for the infringement on the right to bear arms
* for the harassment and aggression towards people without a home
* for the imprisonment of the people into a system known to increase uncivilized behavior & deprive men of safety & sanity
* for committing acts of aggression against the people exercising their liberty by consuming mind-altering substances
Whenever one party profits by another party being punished, there is a misaligned incentive. This applies to a large number of situations, from speed traps, to the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989. Ponder for a moment how incentives would line up if, when someone was punished by law, NOBODY benefited. This can be accomplished by the guilty party literally destroying cash. Imagine the accountants showing up in the courtroom, carrying bags of cash that they had just withdrawn (old bills that need to be replaced anyway), and stuffing them into a special-purpose furnace, where everyone can witness the money being destroyed. (And no, giving the money to charity is still wrong, as then charities would have incentive for parties to commit wrongdoing and get caught.)
--- wad
We dont deserve our place in the global community and will lose it, deservedly so.
Considering that the USA was founded as an effort to escape tyranny and taxation w/o representation, the fact that those hired to protect us are stealing from us, no matter the percentage of this that is the corruption that this may be, is truly disconcerting. This seems to me to be a great reason to bear arms - and perhaps use them!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
Thanks, that's much clearer. I do have one question which should clarify further.
Does your position mean that the KKK and Hitler were just fine, or did the violate people's right? Because the KKK claimed was able to do bad things, does that mean they had the right to, and because their victims weren't always able to defend themselves, themselves victims rights were not violated, because they had no rights?
I'm unclear because although you say rights "are something" that needs to be defended, and that the government should defend rights, you also say that rights do not exist, until AFTER a person claims and defends them.
I don't see how both can be true. If there are no natural rights of man, rights do not pre-exist until AFTER the person defends them, how can you say that government _should_ defend something that doesn't exist?
Assume "rights" is, as you suggest, nothing more than "the strong can subjugate the weak". When you say government should protect rights, that would "government should protect the ability of the strong to subjugate the weak"?
The article FFS!
What local police departments really were doing is clearly what privatering used to be. They're pirates. The cops and especially the district attorneys and officials were pirates and they should meet their end at the end of a rope. In the public square for piracy. They are the lowest of the low. We trusted them and they betrayed us. I think there was a famous ring in Tennesee and a very famous one in Florida. The one in Florida used to jack up general aviation aircraft flying across the country that looked suspicious and might have drugs on board. Sometimes harassing them multiple times on one trip. No drugs found. They should have hunted them down and hung every one of them. Instead I think they just got fired. Probably moved onto other law enforcement positions lying about how great they were. Taking drug money off the streets - and college money, church offerings, money that was inherited, things like that. Blood money, not drug money unless it was by accident.
The point is they had to. As with a lot of bad stuff, they finally burned someone that mattered (stunk so bad they HAD to take the trash out). DOJ should go after a lot of those rogue police departments for piracy. That's what it really was, piracy. Put them in jail where they belong. They were stealing church offerings, college tuitions, inheritance, just money the family had to move to another state, things like that. They only got drug money by mistake, and they knew it. AND THEY KNEW IT. There is no doubt about that. They even had news stories on it. I don't know how they could sleep at night. If I had my way, we should track them down and hang them. Hang 'em high. Especially that little band in Florida that used to go after GA aircraft. They used to call in reports about planes having drugs - totally a guess. The people on the aircraft would get the shake down, sometimes multiple times in one trip. How would you like to be treated like a drug lord several times a day with guns pointed at you, stripped searched, etc.? Worse than calling in a bomb threat, and they were the police! Like I said, they should be hung for piracy.
I am hard right wing and I believe this is crazy that this lawless DOJ has done something good for a change.