libertybrewcity
05-31-2010, 03:37 PM
Thought this was interesting.
How the police can seize your stuff when you have not been proven guilty of anything
HE ARRIVED in Houston with $500 in his pocket. A man he met on the Greyhound bus gave him a room until he found his feet. Zaher El-Ali, a Jordanian immigrant, worked hard and built up a small business renovating and selling cars and houses. He is now a proud American citizen. But, ridiculous though it sounds, his truck is in trouble with the law.
Six years ago, he sold a Chevy Silverado to a man who agreed to pay for it in instalments. Before the truck was paid off, the buyer was arrested for drunken driving. It was his third such arrest, so he was sent to prison and the police seized the truck. Mr Ali applied to get it back. He pointed out that he still held title to the vehicle, and that since the buyer had stopped making payments on it, he was entitled to reclaim it. But the government refused.
In most states the police can seize property they suspect has been used to commit a crime. Under “civil asset forfeiture” laws, they typically do not have to prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that a crime was committed, or even charge anyone with an offence. What is more, the money raised by auctioning seized houses, boats and cars is often used to boost the budgets of the police department that did the seizing. That can mean fancier patrol cars, badass hardware or simply keeping the budget plump in lean times. In one survey 40% of police executives agreed that funds from civil-asset forfeiture were “necessary as a budget supplement”. This conflict of interest has predictable consequences. It spurs the police to pay more attention to cases that are likely to involve seizable assets (such as drug busts) and less attention to other ones. A report from the Institute for Justice, a pressure group, calls it “Policing for Profit”.
An owner can usually challenge a seizure by arguing that he did not know his property was being used for criminal purposes. But in 38 out of 50 states, the burden of proof is on him to prove his innocence. In February Texas demanded to know from Mr Ali whether he had asked the buyer about his previous arrests for drunk driving—as if that were a car dealer’s responsibility. It also demanded a sheaf of irrelevant documents, such as Mr Ali’s bank and tax records for the past two years. Mr Ali’s lawyer, Scott Bullock, argues that this is “clearly designed to intimidate” Mr Ali into giving up. Instead, he is suing to have the Texas civil asset forfeiture law struck down.
...
there has been a 1,500% increase in paramilitary police raids between the early 1980s and the beginning of this decade, reckons Peter Kraska of Eastern Kentucky University.
... www.economist.com/world/united-states/displaystory.cfm%253Fstory_id%253D16219747
How the police can seize your stuff when you have not been proven guilty of anything
HE ARRIVED in Houston with $500 in his pocket. A man he met on the Greyhound bus gave him a room until he found his feet. Zaher El-Ali, a Jordanian immigrant, worked hard and built up a small business renovating and selling cars and houses. He is now a proud American citizen. But, ridiculous though it sounds, his truck is in trouble with the law.
Six years ago, he sold a Chevy Silverado to a man who agreed to pay for it in instalments. Before the truck was paid off, the buyer was arrested for drunken driving. It was his third such arrest, so he was sent to prison and the police seized the truck. Mr Ali applied to get it back. He pointed out that he still held title to the vehicle, and that since the buyer had stopped making payments on it, he was entitled to reclaim it. But the government refused.
In most states the police can seize property they suspect has been used to commit a crime. Under “civil asset forfeiture” laws, they typically do not have to prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that a crime was committed, or even charge anyone with an offence. What is more, the money raised by auctioning seized houses, boats and cars is often used to boost the budgets of the police department that did the seizing. That can mean fancier patrol cars, badass hardware or simply keeping the budget plump in lean times. In one survey 40% of police executives agreed that funds from civil-asset forfeiture were “necessary as a budget supplement”. This conflict of interest has predictable consequences. It spurs the police to pay more attention to cases that are likely to involve seizable assets (such as drug busts) and less attention to other ones. A report from the Institute for Justice, a pressure group, calls it “Policing for Profit”.
An owner can usually challenge a seizure by arguing that he did not know his property was being used for criminal purposes. But in 38 out of 50 states, the burden of proof is on him to prove his innocence. In February Texas demanded to know from Mr Ali whether he had asked the buyer about his previous arrests for drunk driving—as if that were a car dealer’s responsibility. It also demanded a sheaf of irrelevant documents, such as Mr Ali’s bank and tax records for the past two years. Mr Ali’s lawyer, Scott Bullock, argues that this is “clearly designed to intimidate” Mr Ali into giving up. Instead, he is suing to have the Texas civil asset forfeiture law struck down.
...
there has been a 1,500% increase in paramilitary police raids between the early 1980s and the beginning of this decade, reckons Peter Kraska of Eastern Kentucky University.
... www.economist.com/world/united-states/displaystory.cfm%253Fstory_id%253D16219747