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Civil Forfeiture is the Lamest thing ever
MrMonroe
passed outon the floor nowRegistered User regular
passed outon the floor nowRegistered User regular
So a family member of mine is suspected of a crime (I'm not going to say exactly what). The FBI showed up at his doorstep a while back with the Sheriffs and they told him he was under investigation. Without being charged with anything, they charged his stuff with the crime of being suspected to have something to do with a crime, and proceeded to haul off perhaps $75k worth of computer equipment (including monitors), his cameras (professional photographer), his iPod, his entire CD collection, and all his photo albums, including pictures of family as well as records of his work (weddings, sports events, etc.). They seized similar assets belonging to other family members who happen to live with him.
Basically, in order to circumvent that irksome constitutional right to be secure in life liberty and property until convicted of a crime, the police arrest your stuff, charge it with a crime, then hold it indefinitely without ever bringing prosecution to bear on it. (like a computer could be guilty of a crime in the first place) The burden of proof that the stuff was not used in a crime is on the suspect, and in order to even begin proceedings to recover it, one must post a bail bond of 10% of the value of the property seized within 30 days of the seizure. The seized property usually goes up to the feds, who auction it and then return a portion of the money to whatever local agency stole the goods in the first place.
Federal Bureau of Taking All Your Shit indeed.
Basically, in order to circumvent that irksome constitutional right to be secure in life liberty and property until convicted of a crime, the police arrest your stuff, charge it with a crime, then hold it indefinitely without ever bringing prosecution to bear on it. (like a computer could be guilty of a crime in the first place) The burden of proof that the stuff was not used in a crime is on the suspect, and in order to even begin proceedings to recover it, one must post a bail bond of 10% of the value of the property seized within 30 days of the seizure. The seized property usually goes up to the feds, who auction it and then return a portion of the money to whatever local agency stole the goods in the first place.
Federal Bureau of Taking All Your Shit indeed.
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And by corrupt, I mean overly powerful. It's impossible to imbue law enforcement with additional power without receiving additional corruption.
You're right of course. This all comes out of the War on Drugs but has been expanded to many, many other areas.
Well when a policy is as effective* as the War on Drugs has been, how can you not want to expand it to everything?
*effectively producing a huge windfall for the law enforcement industry at the expense of taxpayers
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
The reverse burden without a conviction is simply appalling.
If you ever need to talk to someone, feel free to message me. Yes, that includes you.
You let the government take away your rights out of fear of terrorists.
I've traveled in the USA and for the most part Canadians and Americans aren't nearly as different as everyone likes to think.
I think we are all good people, I know Canadians happily living the US, and I know Americans who live here in Canada and are also quite happy.
Is not the goal of terrorists to make you afraid? Giving in to that fear was basically letting them win....
Yes, some security measures can be taken, yes worldwide crackdowns on terrorist groups make a difference..
but there were a ton of knee jerk reactions and "safety measures" and heck, I'd even slate the war in Iraq as a knee jerk reaction, these knee jerk reactions don't provide actual safety.
The world saw through the veil, to the core of "were scared and angry so were gonna do what we want!" and the rest of the world isn't impressed. It's time to take a step back. Elect Obama, get rid of stupid laws and special powers which provide little in the way of safety and protection and take away your rights. Pull out of Iraq, get national health coverage, and fix your economic problems before you pull the rest of the world into a recession.
Also: how the hell can inanimate objects be guilty of a crime? How do you even go about proving your equipment is innocent? What kinda crime do they accuse your equipment of? illegal file hosting? And data is not stored on 99% of that equipment....its on hard drives...confiscating screens is just ignorant.
Edit: OK I see how taking money criminals made from committing crimes makes sense, but shouldn't the burden of proof rest on the prosecution to prove that the money used to buy the equipment in question or the equipment in question came from criminal acts or criminals who have been convicted?
http://www.fear.org/
Crazy stuff, but hopefully something will done to stop it. I had never heard of this before and it was good to see some info about it.
Not that I don't agree, but Democrats can do the same thing, since they(we) are often morally obligated to do acts "in defense of the people."
EDIT: I was never even aware of this power on the part of law enforcement. After reading up on it, I must say I am somewhat appalled.
This isn't a coincidence is it?
Regardless, check out NPR's site, I think it was during All Thing Considered
EDIT: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91555835 here is the program, have a look or a listen
From the article:
Wow, that's some refined rhetoric right there.
Why didn't he just say "Why are you against this? You a terrorist?"
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Well then. So messed up even a lawyer to be didn't think it would be possible.
Taking goods as the spoils of crime is fine, but you (should?) have to prove that they were obtained through or used to commit crime. Guy files a $10,000 tax return and gets busted with a kilo of cocaine on a speed boat? Fine, take the boat and his Ferrari too. Another guy gets busted with a kilo of cocaine, but doesn't show any unusual assets for his reported income? Fuck off, he's likely a mule.
Can your friend call himself the equipment's guardian and bring a habeas corpus suit?
EDIT: Oops I fail at grammar today.
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One example of how this can hurt innocents: (and I will link this as soon as I have access to the article again)
Back in the 90's this guy got caught with some pot and was offered probation if he started working as an informant. They paid him $4 something/hour... and gave him 10% of all the property seized on his info. He fingered a guy he'd never met, saying he sold him weed that he had grown on his farm. The Feds walked in, with warrant, arrested the guy, and then arrested his 60 acre farm. No marijuana was ever found on the farm, nor and other evidence of drug dealing. The guy never got the farm back because he couldn't post the bail. How many farmers you know that can post bail of 10% of their net physical worth with no notice? (plus lawyers' fees)
Except, what troubles me is that this law isn't exclusively applied to drug traffickers. What also concerns me is that no one took a second to go "well if he can get that much, he can get more just as easily to post the bond on the items" whereas a normal citizen usually can't.
No, really, anti americanism aside, having put some study into compared constitutional traditions, my opinion is the US needs to rewrite their Constitution ASAP.
Proud as you guys are of having the oldest democratic system, you seem painfuly unaware that its age also makes it the patchiest, most archaic one in the western world. Sadly, you've sacralized your Constitution, which is now more a religious than a legal document, and you're not even considering a big time revision at this time.
You should just start on your electoral system and go on from there.
But yeah, I'm so sorry about the abuse. Your relative being guilty or not is beyond the point, that procedure is bullshit either way. I knew people here in simiar situations. They had their business seized on suspicion of copyright infringement. They won the case and got their stuff back, plus extra money due to the biz being closed over Christmas season. They weren't happy about it, but at least they didn't go broke due to the procedure.
EDIT: For the record, the investigation to these guys was IMO very reasonable. They owned a video rental shop AND a DVD copy station, both in the same street. They did a good job of making a legal argument and won, but the investigation wasn't uncalled for. They still got decent compensation money.
That's the problem with the constitution in the first place, it was made to be rewritten.
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It's not the Constitution, it's the fucked up interpretation of it. Also if you think "big time revision" is possible at this point, you're living in a dream world. We need a better administration (as the executive branch controls the FBI and all that) and we need courts to step up and uphold what the Constitution really means.
And I believe Athens was the oldest democratic system :P
Nope, the US is the oldest democratic system still in place without interruption. Everybody else has had more than one constitution in their democratic histories.
And yeah, it's the Constitution. Your maximum legal court is chosen for a lifetime position, which is ridiculous on XXI century lifespans, it contains anachronic dispositions recognizing firearms as rights and not banning death penalty (both inherited from colonial origins, both considered barbaric in most modern democracies), you have a non-proportional electoral system, not applying now-standard D'Hont system and producing statistically inaccurate results that deviate from actual public opinions. Your electoral system is also too long and complex and lacks a few basic guarantees. You have criminal laws tha differ in each state which, again, doesn't make sense on modern transporation systems, you have an excessively presidential system that could potentially render the whole system inactive if things get messy...
It's been patched to be serviceable, but it doesn't hold a candle to a modern Constitution designed to work as a closed system on the basis of nearly 300 years of democratic experience.
Also for the record, Spain got a new constitution in 78 and it's been reformed twice already, and there's a consensus on the need for a big revision to amend the Senate, the Crown and the federal structure already. And ours isn't the youngest Constitution of the bunch.
Modern tends to be better in most things. This is no different.
Let's just say I disagree.
But that's all off topic. On topic, every story in this thread?
Fucked. Up.
You can charge property with a crime? And then seize it? The fuck?!
You disagree with the facts about your system I provided (which are accurate as far as I know) or with the idea that they should cause the US to rewrite their Constitution?
EDIT: Totally honest question, by the way. I really wanna know what you mean, I'm not being sarcastic.
I don't think we need to rewrite our Constitution.
But really this is for another thread.
The only up side to this entire messed up system is the idea of your sofa being called to testify against your recliner.
Yeah, Civil Forfeiture is one of those stupid rules that was made up so that if you couldn't prove something in court but totally knew the dude was a crook, you could still hurt him. Which is not how the laws are supposed to work.
It would be taken as evidence against him then, not civil forfeiture. Though yes, it's a very selective list of shit to take. The photo albums standing out as "uh what?"
Uh, if you read the damn thing you would know that this should be a violation of the Constitution:
It's hard to blame the Constitution when the government can get away with ignoring the spirit of it and in many cases the wording of it. Due process is supposed to mean something.
How can you prove that the gun was used in the crime without having possession of the gun in order to see whether or not it was the gun used in the crime?
Agreed.