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Thread: The Justice Department Didn't Charge Him With a Crime. It's Going to Take $39,000

  1. #1

    Exclamation The Justice Department Didn't Charge Him With a Crime. It's Going to Take $39,000

    Why can't any fat assed Hollyweird celebrities get Trump's ear on this $#@!ing issue.


    The Justice Department Didn't Charge Him With a Crime. It's Going to Take $39,000 from Him Anyway.

    https://reason.com/blog/2018/08/06/t...dnt-charge-him

    It's not a crime to travel with lots of cash. But you still might be treated like a criminal.

    Scott Shackford|Aug. 6, 2018 3:20 pm

    In order to get back any of the money that the New Hampshire State Police took from him, Edward Phipps has agreed to let federal prosecutors keep most of it, even though he has not been charged with any crimes.

    The cops took the cash during a traffic stop in 2016. Phipps wasn't even in the car at the time.

    The police pulled the driver over for tailgating and for going one whole mile per hour over the speed limit. A search turned up a bag full of $46,000 cash in the trunk. Police then brought in a drug-sniffing dog, which came up empty.

    Though they have presented no evidence of any criminal act, police took the money and federal prosecutors declared their intent to force the forfeiture of the funds, so they could keep it. Phipps came forward in July 2017 to indicate that the cash was his, and he said it was obtained legally.

    We took note of this case back in March, and it looks like the Justice Department succeeded in getting its way. As part of a settlement, Phipps has agreed to give the Department of Justice $39,000 of the $46,000 seized.

    This is was a case of civil asset forfeiture, where law enforcement officials take and keep people's assets that they suspect are connected to criminal activity. Often, they can do this without convicting or even charging any person with a crime. Instead the property itself is accused of being linked to misconduct. The "defendant" in this settlement is the cash itself; the Department of Justice is suing a sack of money.

    This weird quirk matters because the burdens of proof in civil courts are often lower than the "beyond a reasonable doubt" required to convict a person. So it's easier for prosecutors to win, and it flips presumption of innocence on its head: Phipps has to hire a lawyer and prove his money isn't connected to criminal activity.

    As part of the settlement, Phipps not only agrees to give up everything but $7,000 (which will probably have to go to his legal fees). He agrees never to request that the money to be returned, and he furthermore agrees never to attempt to assert any claim that the government did not have "probable cause" to make him forfeit the money. I'm highlighting that part of the story to show how much lower the legal threshold is to take somebody's stuff and keep it. "Probable cause" is the amount of evidence police need for a search warrant, not nearly enough to convict somebody of a crime. (A note here: Both a Justice Department official and a reader contacted me to point out that the legal threshold for federal civil forfeiture is "a preponderance of the evidence," a more restrictive requirement than "probable cause." This is true, but the settlement uses the term "probable cause" to describe the justification for the seizure and forfeiture, not the stricter legal requirement.)

    This wasn't supposed to happen. New Hampshire reformed its civil asset forfeiture laws in 2016 to require a criminal conviction before police or prosecutors could force people to forfeit money or property. Unfortunately, the state's reform did not close a loophole that lets local police partner with the feds in a program called Equitable Sharing. In this system, local police use the federal asset forfeiture program instead of their own and then the Justice Department distributes most of the forfeited money back to local law enforcement.

    That's why the Department of Justice is involved here. The state police can't seize Phipps' money on their own. So they went to the feds to arrange the forfeiture, and then the Equitable Sharing program lets the Justice Department funnel the funds right back to local law enforcement.

    It's not money laundering when it's the government.
    Another mark of a tyrant is that he likes foreigners better than citizens, and lives with them and invites them to his table; for the one are enemies, but the Others enter into no rivalry with him. - Aristotle's Politics Book 5 Part 11



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  3. #2
    Someone could get killed for stealing that much money.

  4. #3
    Don't worry Trump will hear about this pretty soon and he'll teach those cops a lesson. He'll be talking their ears off.
    "Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of my administration is minding my own business."

    Calvin Coolidge

  5. #4
    Someone needs to take one of these cases to SCOTUS.
    Rand needs to introduce a bill to end this.
    Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

    Robert Heinlein

    Give a man an inch and right away he thinks he's a ruler

    Groucho Marx

    I love mankind…it’s people I can’t stand.

    Linus, from the Peanuts comic

    You cannot have liberty without morality and morality without faith

    Alexis de Torqueville

    Those who fail to learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
    Those who learn from the past are condemned to watch everybody else repeat it

    A Zero Hedge comment

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Someone could get killed for stealing that much money.
    One should have armed guards when transporting that much money.

  7. #6
    It is a bit confusing. Seems that Phipps was not the person the money was seized from. He later claimed it was his.

    http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/2...5-traffic-stop

    Can't copy paste so see the link.

    It started October, 2016. Man named Alexander Temple of Portland, Maine was stopped in New Hampshire on a "two moving violations" (speeding and tailgating). Temple nervous so car searched. Drug dog alerted on a backpack. Some Whole Foods bags were found with five stacks of $20 bills wrapped with rubber bands. Had a Medical Marijuana card for Maine with his name on it. Kratom (which is not illegal) was also found in the car. No marijuana was found. Dog could have alerted on residue from his personal Medical Marijuana but they used that as the reason to seize the money- that it could have been drug related. Temple was not arrested. The car was registered in Massachusetts. So guy from Maine driving a car from Massachusetts stopped in New Hampshire gets money taken from him (the highway he was on runs between Boston MA and Portland ME passing through New Hampshire) despite not being arrested or charged with anything (no indication he was charged with the traffic offenses he was pulled over for but nothing to say he wasn't either- he could have been ticked and released). And he wasn't the one who asked for it back.

    Temple said the money was loan from his sister. She denied it. Then he said it was an inheritance from his father. Father denied that.

    Then sometime later (August 2017 so almost a year later), this guy named Edward Phipps come forward to claim the money is his. Two months after that (October- now a year after the initial traffic stop), he files a claim for it. His address is a post office box in Bridgeton, Maine (about 40 miles from Portland where Temple was from). He claimed the money was "legally and lawfully" his but at the time of this article (December 2017) did not say what the money was supposedly being legally used for. He claimed the seizure was an "excessive fine" in violation of the Eighth Amendment.

    Kinda sounds like at least one of them (probably Phipps) runs a medical marijuana shop in Maine and his buddy Temple was making a delivery outside the state for him. A $46,000 delivery. Medical Marijuana is legal (with proper paperwork) in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.



    Last edited by Zippyjuan; 08-07-2018 at 06:00 PM.

  8. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by Zippyjuan View Post
    It is a bit confusing. Seems that Phipps was not the person the money was seized from. He later claimed it was his.

    http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/2...5-traffic-stop

    Can't copy paste so see the link.

    It started October, 2016. Man named Alexander Temple of Portland, Maine was stopped in New Hampshire on a "two moving violations". Temple nervous so car searched. Drug dog alerted on a backpack. Some Whole Foods bags were found with five stacks of $20 bills wrapped with rubber bands. Had a Medical Marijuana card for Maine with his name on it. Kratom (which is not illegal) was also found in the car. No marijuana was found. Dog could have alerted on residue from his personal Medical Marijuana but they used that as the reason to seize the money- that it could have been drug related. Temple was not arrested.

    Temple said the money was loan from his sister. She denied it. Then he said it was an inheritance from his father. Father denied that.

    Then sometime later (August 2017 so almost a year later), this guy named Edward Phipps come forward to claim the money is his. Two months after that (October- now a year after the initial traffic stop), he files a claim for it. His address is a post office box in Maine. He claimed the money was "legally and lawfully" his but at the time of this article (December 2017) did not say what the money was supposedly being legally used for. He claimed the seizure was an "excessive fine" in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
    Does one have to say what there personal money is for?

    Any any event, we know the cops didn't own it before stealing it.

  9. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Does one have to say what there personal money is for?

    Any any event, we know the cops didn't own it before stealing it.
    If it is legal, it should not be hard to have a story which holds up and doesn't keep changing all the time (and is proven wrong). If it belonged to his employer, give them his name and let him vouch for you. Instead he said he got if from his sister and she said he didn't when they called to verify. Then there is the oddity of the second party waiting nearly a year to try to say it was his. If you lost $46,000 wouldn't you try to get it back right away? Only an out of state PO box for an address? Would you give the money to that person?
    Last edited by Zippyjuan; 08-07-2018 at 05:28 PM.



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  11. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Zippyjuan View Post
    If it is legal, it should not be hard to have a story which holds up and doesn't keep changing all the time (and is proven wrong). Then there is the oddity of the second party waiting nearly a year to try to say it was his. If you lost $46,000 wouldn't you try to get it back right away? Only an out of state PO box for an address? Would you give the money to that person?
    It's not up to you to prove it is legal, it is up to them to prove it is illicit. Or I should say that it should be. If you heard that your money was seized under suspicion of being illicit wouldn't you take time to consult a lawyer? Maybe have a plan together before walking in and saying "Yo, dick head, that money is mine, give it back?" You're a bigger moron than I suspected.

  12. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    It's not up to you to prove it is legal, it is up to them to prove it is illicit. Or I should say that it should be. If you heard that your money was seized under suspicion of being illicit wouldn't you take time to consult a lawyer? Maybe have a plan together before walking in and saying "Yo, dick head, that money is mine, give it back?" You're a bigger moron than I suspected.
    He never asked for it back. Some other guy who wasn't even there did.

    None of it makes any sense. From the seizure (without any charges) to a third party trying to claim it a year later.
    Last edited by Zippyjuan; 08-07-2018 at 05:33 PM.

  13. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Zippyjuan View Post
    He never asked for it back. Some other guy who wasn't even there did.

    None of it makes any sense. From the seizure (without any charges) to a third party trying to claim it a year later.
    I recon they'll get to the bottom of it Dec. 11th or thereabouts.

  14. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    I recon they'll get to the bottom of it Dec. 11th or thereabouts.
    That was December 2017. Already over. The OP was about the settlement reached. The "defendant" in the case was the $46,000. "US vs $46,000". That is strange too. Can money be charged with a crime?

    Instead the property itself is accused of being linked to misconduct. The "defendant" in this settlement is the cash itself; the Department of Justice is suing a sack of money.
    Last edited by Zippyjuan; 08-07-2018 at 06:01 PM.

  15. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Someone could get killed for stealing that much money.
    I feel that is the right thing .
    Do something Danke

  16. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Zippyjuan View Post
    That was December 2017. Already over. The OP was about the settlement reached. The "defendant" in the case was the $46,000. "US vs $46,000". That is strange too. Can money be charged with a crime?
    From YOUR article:

    a trial is scheduled for Dec. 11, 2018.

  17. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    From YOUR article:
    So it does. The article is from December 6, 2017 so I assumed it was the same December. (Could be a typo too since again the OP is about the settlement of the case). Or perhaps the settlement was to avoid going to trial. Anyways, it seems to be all over.

  18. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by Zippyjuan View Post
    "US vs $46,000". That is strange too. Can money be charged with a crime?
    My god Zip, have you been paying any attention to this issue at all.

    That is the key componenet of the theft.

    The government doesn't charge you, a person who still has a few shreds of liberty left.

    They claim the money is guilty and charge the money.

    Yeah, the whole things sounds shifty...so $#@!ing what?

    "Suspicion of unknown hanky panky" is not a justification for government theft.



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  20. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post

    "Suspicion of unknown hanky panky" is not a justification for government theft.
    There's LOTS of case law saying it is.

  21. #18
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  22. #19
    So he had $7,000 in additional income in 2018. I wonder what is the tax rate on that?



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