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Post by avordvet on Nov 17, 2015 13:48:13 GMT -5
Police Asset Forfeitures Exceed The Value Of All Burglaries In 2014Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/17/2015 13:30 -0500, Submitted by Martin Armstrong via ArmstrongEconomics.com, Between 1989 and 2010, U.S. attorneys seized an estimated $12.6 billion in asset forfeiture cases. The growth rate during that time averaged +19.4% annually. In 2010 alone, the value of assets seized grew by +52.8% from 2009 and was six times greater than the total for 1989. Then by 2014, that number had ballooned to roughly $4.5 billion for the year, making this 35% of the entire number of assets collected from 1989 to 2010 in a single year. Now, according to the FBI, the total amount of goods stolen by criminals in 2014 burglary offenses suffered an estimated $3.9 billion in property losses. This means that the police are now taking more assets than the criminals. www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-11-17/police-civil-asset-forfeitures-exceed-value-all-burglaries-2014
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Post by avordvet on Mar 20, 2017 5:21:15 GMT -5
Supreme Court Justice Slams Civil ForfeitureJustice Clarence Thomas questions the constitutionality of taking property from motorists with civil procedures.TheNewspaper, 3/8/2017 The idea that the government can take away someone's car or cash without due process offends at least one member of the US Supreme Court. In a statement Monday, Justice Clarence Thomas called on his colleagues to revisit civil asset forfeiture, the process that allows prosecutors to go after assets allegedly linked in some way to a crime. The justice argued the system has been widely abused. "Civil proceedings often lack certain procedural protections that accompany criminal proceedings, such as the right to a jury trial and a heightened standard of proof," Justice Thomas explained. "Partially as a result of this distinct legal regime, civil forfeiture has in recent decades become widespread and highly profitable. And because the law enforcement entity responsible for seizing the property often keeps it, these entities have strong incentives to pursue forfeiture." www.thenewspaper.com/news/51/5164.asp
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Post by avordvet on Sept 21, 2017 4:14:56 GMT -5
Has asset forfeiture gone too far? Truck seizure case sparks outrage, a call for changeBy Doug McKelway, Fox News, Sept 21 2017 WASHINGTON – Two years ago, Gerardo Serano – an American citizen, Kentucky farmer and a one-time GOP Kentucky statehouse candidate – was driving his brand new, $60,000 Ford F-250 pick-up truck to visit relatives in Mexico, snapping pictures along the way, when Customs and Border Patrol agents halted him at the border, demanded his cell phone, and asked him why he was taking pictures. "I just wanted the opening of the bridge. I was gonna take the opening of the bridge, the entrance of the bridge. That’s all I wanted to do," Serano told Fox News. As a self-proclaimed student of the Constitution, Serano said he knew his rights, and protested to Customs and Border Patrol agents vehemently when they asked him to unlock his phone. SHOWDOWN LOOMS BETWEEN CONGRESS, POLICE OVER CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE "You need a warrant for that," he says he told them. They searched his truck and found five bullets in a magazine clip that Serano, a Kentucky concealed carry permit holder, forgot to remove before leaving his home. www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/09/20/has-asset-forfeiture-gone-too-far-truck-seizure-case-sparks-outrage-call-for-change.html
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Post by avordvet on Nov 30, 2018 13:08:33 GMT -5
"Excessive Fines"? Bullshit, it's government sanctioned THEFT! High court likely to say states can’t levy excessive finesBy MARK SHERMAN, November 28, 2018 WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court left little doubt Wednesday that it would rule that the Constitution’s ban on excessive fines applies to the states, an outcome that could help an Indiana man recover the $40,000 Land Rover police seized when they arrested him for selling about $400 worth of heroin. A decision in favor of 37-year-old Tyson Timbs, of Marion, Indiana, also could buttress efforts to limit the confiscation by local law enforcement of property belonging to someone suspected of a crime. Police and prosecutors often keep the proceeds. Timbs was on hand at the high court for arguments that were largely a one-sided affair in which the main question appeared to be how broadly the state would lose. The court has formally held that most of the Bill of Rights applies to states as well as the federal government, but it has not done so on the Eighth Amendment’s excessive-fines ban. apnews.com/f60d5690704648edbf7a967cb6d6e8df
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Post by avordvet on Feb 4, 2019 5:37:46 GMT -5
TAKEN: How police departments make millions by seizing propertyAnna Lee and Nathaniel Cary and Mike Ellis, The Greenville News, Jan 27 2019 In South Carolina, civil forfeiture targets black people’s money most of all, exclusive investigative data shows When a man barged into Isiah Kinloch’s apartment and broke a bottle over his head, the North Charleston resident called 911. After cops arrived on that day in 2015, they searched the injured man’s home and found an ounce of marijuana. So they took $1,800 in cash from his apartment and kept it. ______ When Eamon Cools-Lartigue was driving on Interstate 85 in Spartanburg County, deputies stopped him for speeding. The Atlanta businessman wasn’t criminally charged in the April 2016 incident. Deputies discovered $29,000 in his car, though, and decided to take it. ______ When Brandy Cooke dropped her friend off at a Myrtle Beach sports bar as a favor, drug enforcement agents swarmed her in the parking lot and found $4,670 in the car. Her friend was wanted in a drug distribution case, but Cooke wasn’t involved. She had no drugs and was never charged in the 2014 bust. Agents seized her money anyway. She worked as a waitress and carried cash because she didn’t have a checking account. She spent more than a year trying to get her money back. ______ The Greenville News and Anderson Independent Mail examined these cases and every other court case involving civil asset forfeiture in South Carolina from 2014-2016. Our examination was aimed at understanding this little-discussed, potentially life-changing power that state law holds over citizens — the ability of officers to seize property from people, even if they aren't charged with a crime www.greenvilleonline.com/in-depth/news/taken/2019/01/27/civil-forfeiture-south-carolina-police-property-seizures-taken-exclusive-investigation/2457838002/
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