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View Full Version : Alabama Senate Considers Curtailing Civil Asset Forfeiture




Swordsmyth
02-19-2018, 05:54 PM
The people’s representatives in the Alabama State Legislature are considering curtailing the power of the state’s law enforcement officers from seizing the property (including the money) of individuals who have not been convicted of any crime.
Some sheriffs and other police agencies do not support this proposal, however. In fact, two law-enforcement officials are so adamant that lawmakers not revoke this power that they have penned an op-ed in opposition to the bill, and in that article they are remarkably frank about how fruitful the civil asset forfeiture policy has been for cops in the Heart of Dixie.
Just how profitable has the program been in Alabama?

A report published earlier this year revealed that in 2015, Alabama law enforcement seized nearly $2.2 million! The data was gathered from 14 of the state’s 67 counties.
It isn’t unexpected, then, that police officials do not want that gravy train derailed. In their op-ed published on February 12 on AL.com, Brian McVeigh, Calhoun County district attorney and president of the Alabama District Attorneys Association, and Dave Sutton, sheriff of Coffee County and president of the Alabama Sheriffs Association, vigorously pleaded for protection of their power to seize people’s property without due process.
What is remarkable about the article, though, is the open admission that they currently deny due process to those whose property they seize and that they really like the money it brings in. They write:
Two changes to the state's civil forfeiture law are especially concerning to DAs and law enforcement. One would allow forfeiture only if there is a criminal conviction; the other would require that any proceeds from forfeitures go to the state's General Fund rather than local law enforcement. Though these changes may sound good, they would hurt public safety and make civil forfeiture less fair.
Requiring criminal convictions would result in more criminal charges filed and more people going to prison for lesser crimes. Consider pretrial diversion programs, such as drug court, for example. These programs allow people arrested for nonviolent crimes, including some drug charges, to go into treatment and other programs that keep them out of prison. Participants in these programs are not convicted of a crime, so under the proposed change, the only way to deprive them of their ill-gotten gains would be to prosecute them.
Meanwhile, sending the proceeds of forfeiture to the state's General Fund would result in fewer busts of drug and stolen property rings. What incentive would local police and sheriffs have to invest manpower, resources and time in these operations if they don't receive proceeds to cover their costs?
Requiring convictions before seizure? Why should we have to prosecute people before taking their money and property from them?
Two words: due process!
The Alabama Forfeiture Accountability and Integrity Reform Act, SB 213, would make criminal prosecution “the only procedure” whereby property may be seized in Alabama.

More at: https://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/crime/item/28305-alabama-senate-considers-curtailing-civil-asset-forfeiture