Reason: The Forfeiture Racket

[Winehole23]

Holy , this is huge:

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.

Since 2008, thousands of local and state police agencies have made more than 55,000 seizures of cash and property worth $3 billion under a civil asset forfeiture program at the Justice Department called Equitable Sharing.

The program has enabled local and state police to make seizures and then have them “adopted” by federal agencies, which share in the proceeds. The program allowed police departments and drug task forces to keep up to 80 percent of the proceeds of the adopted seizures, with the rest going to federal agencies.

“With this new policy, effective immediately, the Justice Department is taking an important step to prohibit federal agency adoptions of state and local seizures, except for public safety reasons,” Holder said in a statement.

Holder’s decision allows some limited exceptions, including illegal firearms, ammunition, explosives and property associated with child pornography, a small fraction of the total. This would eliminate virtually all cash and vehicle seizures made by local and state police from the program.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/invest...ddc_story.html

[Winehole23]

Holder’s action comes as members of both parties in Congress are working together to craft legislation to overhaul civil asset forfeiture. Last Friday, Sens. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and Mike Lee (R-Utah), along with Reps. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-Wis.) and John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), signed a letter calling on Holder to end Equitable Sharing.


Grassley praised Holder’s decision on Friday.


“We’re going to have a fairer justice system because of it,” Grassley said. “The rule of law ought to protect innocent people and civil asset forfeiture hurt a lot of people.”

same

[boutons_deux]

Holy , this is huge:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/invest...ddc_story.html

yep, enormous. and many, many years too late. All credit, even late, to the Dem Exec.

how many 1000s of lives have police bankrupted, destroyed by civil forfeiture?

[ElNono]

great news, tbh

[Winehole23]

Repugs will block any law changing

Republicans support the forthcoming legislative reform, but Holder got out in front of it in a big way.

[Winehole23]

Looks like you're wrong on this one, boutons.

[boutons_deux]

Republicans support the forthcoming legislative reform, but Holder got out in front of it in a big way.

what reform?

[Winehole23]

forthcoming. can't you read?

[boutons_deux]

How Seized Gadgets Fund Electronic Surveillance

Last year, the Washington Post's investigative team used the Freedom of Information Act to liberate hundreds of thousands of do ents associated with federal asset forfeiture, including the entire collection of annual spending disclosures ("Equitable Sharing Agreements") filed with the U.S. Department of Justice by each individual law enforcement agency and task force across the country that receives these funds.

The do ents reveal a wide variety of spending, from using seized assets to pay for new vehicles and helicopters, drug "buy" money, payments to confidential informants, travel expenses, law enforcement equipment, and rewards for police, such as "challenge coins.

An examination of these do ents reveal the connection between seized assets and electronic surveillance across the country. It many ways, it has been a circular, self-sustaining system: asset forfeiture helps law enforcement agencies pay for electronic surveillance, which allows cops to seize more money to pay for electronic surveillance.

http://gizmodo.com/asset-forfeiture-...+%28Gizmodo%29

[TeyshaBlue]

forthcoming. can't you read?

No.

[pgardn]

Just lay it bare.

Im glad this stuff gets out and publicized.

[boutons_deux]

Why Eric Holder's civil forfeiture reforms can't keep police from taking your stuff

What the Department of Justice actually announced on Friday was a set of new restrictionson the federal Equitable Sharing Program, which transfers proceeds from seized property to the local and state police departments who made the seizure. The change may affect less than 15 percent of the revenue local and state police departments get from the federal program. While that could have a major impact on some of the worst abuses by police, it falls far short of ending the program altogether — and many of the exploits it enables.

"The exceptions swallow the change," Eapen Thampy, executive director of Americans for Forfeiture Reform, said.

The federal program allows local and state police to seize property without evidence of wrongdoing

Cops can still seize assets in joint investigations with federal authorities

Holder's order only curtails "adoptions" that are requested through the federal program by a local or state police department working on its own. It still allows local and state police to seize and keep assets when working with federal authorities on an investigation, and when the property is linked to public safety concerns — such as illegal firearms, ammunition, and explosives.

The exemption for joint investigations with the feds could leave more than 80 percent of the money captured by local and state police through the federal program untouched. Only about 13 percent of the equitable sharing revenue local and state police got in 2014 came from "adoptions," according to data from the Department of Justice.

Police will be able to work with federal authorities or deputize officers into federal agents to continue most or all of their asset forfeiture activity, Thampy of Americans for Forfeiture Reform argued. And police could use the public safety exemptions, particularly for firearms, to target a wide swath of Americans for asset forfeitures.

http://www.vox.com/2015/1/20/7860363...sharing-police

[boutons_deux]

one down, 1000s to go

IRS Shuts Down Another High-Profile Asset Forfeiture Case, Gives $447,000 Back To Its Rightful Owners

The same seems to have happened here. Many of the reports on asset forfeiture also detailed the plight of the Hirsch family, whose convenience store distribution company's account attracted IRS attention for the same reason. Asset forfeiture went into play and the IRS walked off with nearly a half-million of Bi-County Distribution's money. Over two years later, the case is suddenly being dropped and the money returned to its rightful owners.

The government acknowledged in its agreement to return the money that the Hirsch brothers, who operate Bi-County, were never charged with any crime. In fact, all of the money deposited by the Hirsches was lawfully earned from their small business, according to the Ins ute for Justice, a libertarian law firm in Arlington, Va., that represented the Hirsches.

The Hirsch case was helped by the family's retention of a forensic accountant, who prepared a report analyzing the company's deposits and financial transactions and handed it over to federal prosecutors. However, it was not helped by the IRS' refusal to make the next move after it seized the family's money back in 2012.

During the two-and-a-half years that the government held the money, federal prosecutors filed no formal action in court to complete the forfeiture, which deprived the Hirsch brothers of an opportunity to contest the seizure in court.

So, media heat or not, it took a lawsuit filed by the Hirsch family to finally regain the $447,000 from the IRS. The settlement doesn't do much for the family who spent more than two years fighting this, as the agreement stipulates each party is responsible for its own legal fees. This will hit the Hirsches harder than it hits the US government since only the former party will be paying out of its own pocket.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20...l-owners.shtml

What do you think Hirsch's lawyers, accountants took out the $447K? 20%? I guess Hirsch can claim the lawyer fees as tax deductible.

[Winehole23]

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...tice/23737663/

[RandomGuy]

Do Federal prosecutors and the IRS still use super seals to take money from suspects secretly?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/t...lly-abhorrent/

wow... I kind of wish the hysterics pointed at Obamacare was pointed at stuff like this.

[RandomGuy]

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...tice/23737663/

"He is disabled and lives alone. They took the man's cell phone and his car, and left him out there alone. He doesn't have a landline. He was stranded out there for three days until somebody stopped by."

Icky.

[RandomGuy]

The American Civil Liberties Union has intervened in Michigan cases as well. In 2008, a Detroit Police Department SWAT team, dressed in black and with guns drawn, raided the city's Museum of Contemporary Art, where 130 patrons were celebrating Funk Night, a well-attended monthly party of dancing, drinking and art gazing. The patrons were forced to the ground and, in some cases, purses were searched. All of the patrons were issued tickets for "loitering in a place of illegal occupation," because the museum had failed to get a permit to serve alcohol.

Then police began confiscating their cars, having them towed away under the city's "nuisance abatement" program and insisting that patrons pay $900 apiece to get them back. The ACLU filed suit and the city agreed to drop the criminal charges but refused to return the cars.

The ACLU filed a second suit in 2010, demanding that the cars be returned, and U.S. District Judge Victoria Roberts agreed in 2012, noting that illegal search and seizures were a "widespread practice" and a "custom" of the Detroit Police Department.

Remind me to renew my donation to the ACLU.

[boutons_deux]

Driver who had $50,000 in casino winnings seized by Nevada Deputy getting money back






Deputy Dove found $50,000 in Nguyen's briefcase and confiscated it. Deputy Dove did not charge Nguyen with any crime. Nguyen asked Deputy Dove not to take his money, which he said was casino winnings. According to Nguyen's lawsuit, Deputy Dove "threatened to seize and tow his car unless he 'got in his car and drove off and forgot this ever happened.'"

But in a settlement reached last week with Humboldt County, Nevada, Nguyen was fully reimbursed for all of the cash that was taken from him. He also received $10,000 to cover attorney’s fees.

In addition, the settlement fully reimbursed $2,400 to Matt Lee, who, like Nguyen, was pulled over and had his cash confiscated by Dove on I-80. Lee slammed that seizure as “highway robbery.”

In a statement released last Friday, the Humboldt County District Attorney’s Office noted the two cases raised “procedural issues.” The stops were “legally made” and the cash “lawfully seized.”

Nguyen’s attorney disagrees. “If they had a defense, they wouldn’t have paid us,” said John Ohlson, a Reno lawyer who represented Nguyen. These cash seizures are a “hot-button topic in Humboldt County,” Ohlson added. “A lot of people don’t like it.”

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/0...k?detail=email

[boutons_deux]

‘Policing for Profit’ Gone Wild!

While civil asset forfeiture was originally conceived as way to drain resources away from powerful criminal organizations, a new Drug Policy Alliance report –

Above the Law: An Investigation of Civil Asset Forfeiture Abuses in California –

shows how it has now become a relied-upon source of funding for law enforcement agencies all across the state.

Civil forfeiture isn’t limited to wealthy individuals and seizures of ranches, yachts, and vehicles. In fact, the average value of a state seizure in California in 2013 was only $8,542. The low-income and immigrant families often targeted by police for asset forfeiture don’t have the financial resources needed to navigate state law and the long, complicated process to get their property back.

http://www.alternet.org/drugs/polici...er1035650&t=15

[boutons_deux]

The IRS seized $107,000 from this business owner for making too many small cash deposits

If you deposit more than $10,000 in cash, your bank is required to file a form with the authorities reporting the transaction. But the law also makes it illegal to "structure" deposits — depositing cash in amounts under $10,000 to avoid triggering the reporting requirement.

But aggressive enforcement of these laws can ensnare small business owners whose only crime is dealing in cash. This video tells the story of Lyndon McLellan, a convenience store owner in rural North Carolina who had $107,702 seized by the IRS. The agency hasn't charged McLellan with any crime, but under controversial civil asset forfeiture rules the burden of proof is on him to prove he didn't violate the "structuring" laws. The video was made by the Ins ute for Justice, a libertarian public interest law firm that is representing McLellan.

The New York Times points out that business owners can have legitimate reasons for keeping their cash deposits under $10,000. For example, some store owners have insurance policies that only cover cash losses up to $10,000.

It won't be easy for McLellan to get his money back. Many forfeiture targets don't bother to contest seizures under civil forfeiture laws because legal fees would exceed the value of what was taken. But with IJ's help, he might be able to recover the money the IRS took from him.

The IRS declined to comment on the case, citing taxpayer privacy laws.

http://www.vox.com/2015/5/2/8528845/...vil-forfeiture

But Wall St escapes after STEALING Ms of homes, and hiding $Ts overseas.

[boutons_deux]

Hurray, Montana Says Cops Can’t Steal All Your Sh*t And Sell It For Cash Anymore!

Read more at http://wonkette.com/585420/hurray-mo...DkuW1mw0ebk.99

[boutons_deux]

‘Why take my vibrator?': Michigan cops legally rob ‘every belonging’ from medical marijuana patient

Medical marijuana user Ginnifer Hency told a group of Michigan lawmakers last week that a drug task force raided her home and kept ‘every belonging’ she owned — including her vibrator — even after a judge dismissed the charges against her.

Hency explained that her neurologist had recommended medical marijuana to treat pain associated with multiple sclerosis. She is also registered in the state of Michigan as a caregiver for five other patients, giving her the ability to distribute medical marijuana.

Hency said that the six ounces in her locked backpack were in compliance with Michigan medical marijuana laws when a drug task force raided her home with four children present.

“They took everything, even though I was fully compliant with the Michigan medical marijuana laws,” she said. “They charged me with possession with intent to deliver, even though I’m allowed to posses and deliver.”

A St. Clair County judge dropped the charges against Hency, but for 10 months law enforcement officials have refused to give back her belongings.

“They have had my stuff for 10 months, my ladder, my iPad, my children’s iPads, my children’s phones, my medicine for my patients,” Hency noted. “Why a ladder? Why my vibrator, I don’t know either. Why TVs?”

“The prosecutor came out to me and said, ‘Well, I can still beat you in civil court. I can still take your stuff.’”

Hency recalled, adding, “I was at a loss. I literally just sat there dumbfounded.”

“And I was just sitting there, like, thinking I was going to be able to get my stuff back, but not in this country. And that is why civil asset forfeiture in this state needs to change.”

According to Sullum, the Michigan House Judiciary Committee is considering a bill that would require local law enforcement agencies to report forfeitures to the state police, and it would raise the standard of proof required for civil forfeiture in drug cases.

But under the proposed law, local agencies would continue to keep 100 percent of the proceeds from forfeitures, “which gives them a strong incentive to target people based on the assets they own instead of the threat they pose to public safety,” Sullum wrote.

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/05/why-...e+Raw+Story%29

The forfeiture goons must have a great laugh stealing her vibrator. A ladder, some cop must have needed one.

And obviously they know what do with her electronics.

America is ed by the War on Drugs, and un able.

Mexico, too:

Leading Mexican Journalist Explains Why Everything You're Hearing About The Drug War Is Wrong


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/0...n_7476278.html

She claims USA made a deal with Sinaloa cartel/El Chapo to leave them alone if Sinaloa cartel would give info on the other cartels.

[RandomGuy]

[boutons_deux]

Judge blasts government for seizing $167,000 from man in Nevada who was driving too slow

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/judg...e+Raw+Story%29

[boutons_deux]

Cops Seize College Kid's Savings for No Reason: 5 Outrageous Cases of Asset Forfeiture

Asset forfeiture is a police procedure whereby local police departments can confiscate the property of Americans if they can make a case that this property is essential to criminal activity. You would think such power would be limited to seizing items such as firearms or other dangerous materials, but police departments often abuse this power to grab all sorts of things -- even from people who . Here’s five crazy cases:

1. Seizing The Life Savings Of A 24-Year-Old:

In 2014, a college student named Charles Clarke was traveling [3] through Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky airport when he was accused of having his bag smell like marijuana. Police then went on to seize the $11,000 found within it, accusing him of having done a drug deal to get the money. 13 different departments are now trying to gain control of the money seized from Clarke, although he was never convicted of a crime (there were no drugs in his bag).

2. Confiscating $75,000 From A Budding Restauranteur:

A 55-year old Chinese American from Georgia was traveling in Alabama when police seized $75,000 [4] he had raised from his relatives to open a new Chinese restaurant. After ten months of legal battles, he was able to get the money back, but he was set back by his own legal fees.

3. Taking Everything From A Cancer Patient:

Police in Michigan busted [5] into Thomas Williams’s home, accusing him of dealing marijuana -- he wasn’t, but as a cancer patient, he was legally allowed to cultivate his own. Police took $11,000, his car, his shotgun, and other belongings and a year later he was still fighting to get them back.

4. Snatch And Grab From Poker Players:

Two poker players driving in Iowa had $100,000 taken [6] from them by Iowa police. The encounter with police led to one indictment for possessing drug paraphernalia. There was no hard and fast evidence that the money seized was at all related to any drug crime.


5. Decimating A Nail Salon Owner’s Life Savings:

Vu Do, a man who owns two nail salons in New York City, had $44,000, his life savings, taken from him [7] by the Drug Enforcement Agency while he was at JFK Airport. He had planned to take the money to California to help his family. He didn’t receive even a citation before having his money taken from him, which makes the government’s case that he may have been drug dealing all the more bizarre.
Abuses have become common enough to where two states have banned [8] civil asset forfeiture altogether while the federal government has started to limit its own use of the procedure.

http://www.alternet.org/print/cops-s...set-forfeiture