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Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime and if they don't they should

Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime and if they don't they should be forced to return all of your property. I've read articles about how some police departments are training their staff to engage in this behavior and using forfeiture as a profit center. What they are doing is wholesale theft.

wahnfrieden 3y ago
The money is often used on personal expenditures like a new F-350 truck for personal use, commemorative Super Bowl badges, or premium salmon-jerky dogfood (actual examples from Georgia). Most seized money does not even get put into a general fund for budget-based reallocation and is left up to discretionary "slush fund" use.
bsder 3y ago
The "proper" solution is that any property, cash, fines, etc. produced by the "criminal justice" system goes only to victims and anything extra should always go into a fund that gets returned directly to the citizens. It doesn't go into a budget. It doesn't fund anything else. Anything collected goes to victims or it goes back to the people. This would stop ALL of the perverse incentives.
- maxbond 3y ago
  Not quite all, the arbitrary exercise of power is itself an incentive. You can use it to intimidate people or to punish people you don't have the evidence to prosecute (which is to say, those with the presumption of innocence). That would help a ton though.
- Gibbon1 3y ago
  After thinking of this exact thing for maybe 30 years I think all fines, etc should be turned over to the Social Security Administration. Advantage something like 98% of the money transferred to SS goes right back out the door.
  - kuboble 3y ago
    Where I live we have the electricity bill system that kind of works that way. The idea is that let us say the normal price of electricity would be e.g. 10c / kwH. To incentivize people to use less electricity we charge 20c/ but the extra 10c go to the fund which at the end of the year is split evenly between all electricity consumers. So basically everyone pays 20c x consumption -10c x (average consumption).
    - mulmen 3y ago
      So your suggestion is that the cops should seize everyone’s property then reallocate it at years end?
      - kuboble 3y ago
        No. I'm just pointing out a working system where there is a negative financial incentive used to police the population behavior without the problem caused by making it a profit for whoever creates the policy.
        mulmen 3y ago
        We don’t need financial incentives in law enforcement. We need to lock up thieves regardless of their attire.
  - mulmen 3y ago
    Nope. CAF is theft. Reallocating the ill got gains to something you like doesn’t make it right. SSA is worth funding on its own. We shouldn’t need to arbitrarily steal from people to fund it. And we certainly shouldn’t leave SSA funding up to the police. We have fundamental concepts like equal representation and equal treatment under the law that clearly show CAF to be wrong.
    - maxbond 3y ago
      Still a good idea for eg parking tickets (I don't think they meant to offer a defence of CAF).
- asveikau 3y ago
  Victims of crime should not be given special powers. If anything, their biased position makes them less able to understand that the accused has rights, should be evaluated impartially, are presumed innocent, and shouldn't be subject to unfair punishment if proven guilty. I'm really tired of seeing internet commentary on "tough on crime" attitudes where people think victims are basically judge and jury, possibly omniscient, and their hurt and revenge fantasies should decide policy for millions of unrelated people, supersedes the needs of everybody else, like our need to have an impartial justice system and prevent wrongful conviction. But getting back to your comment, if you want to know where the "perverse incentive" is in your proposal, it creates incentive for someone to falsely present themselves as a victim of a crime.
willcipriano 3y ago
Nope, here are the rules: https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-4/ https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-4/ No time limit nonsense, get a warrant. Charge them with a crime. That's the law no matter what the idiots running courthouses in this country think, your precedent has no power here.
- readthenotes1 3y ago
  It's more like: any assets taken by civil asset forfeiture should fund civics classes so that the people that are having their property stolen know just how anti-American that is.
  - pydry 3y ago
    I think they know. If you polled the country a tiny fraction would say that they think it's a good thing.
    - tremon 3y ago
      It depends on how you frame the question. Asking "Should the police be allowed to seize large amounts of cash from a suspicious-looking (white guy/black guy/latino/hobo/terrorist/banker/politician)" will most likely get you a "yes" answer, as long as you pick the right target for your audience.
  - deprecative 3y ago
    Civil forfeiture is a foundational part of the American way. We traded in humans at the start of our country. That has never stopped. Instead of being African Americans (or Black people generally) in current reality it's... our Black communities who we target and throw in prison which is the only exception. Then look at Capitalism. Exploiting labor to drain any opportunity of wealth building from the working class and transferring it to those with wealth. People have this twisted idea that America is a moral or ethical place. It's not. We live in a toxic culture and it has always been and it will continue to be. There is no escape.
- 3y ago
Sohcahtoa82 3y ago
CAF shouldn't be happening. Period. The government suspects someone of committing a crime? File charges and bring them to court. At the very least, CAF should require a warrant. Cops should not be able to seize assets as part of a typical traffic stop. I just can't see how CAF has survived so long without being ruled a violation of our Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures.
- RhodesianHunter 3y ago
  People seem to think the police exist to enforce laws and justice. The police exist to maintain and protect existing power structures, including the police themselves. A lot starts making more sense in that context.
  - mulmen 3y ago
    The police should exist to enforce law and justice. This prevents mob rule. You are correct that police do not currently serve this purpose.
    - jakelazaroff 3y ago
      The police do prevent "mob rule" today. They use violence to keep a minority of wealthy people atop a social hierarchy. When the "mob" below acts up, they violently quash them. Like, think of any mass social protest movement. Who is the primary "boots-on-the-ground" opposition? It is always the police. It will always be the police. That's what they're there for.
      - postalrat 3y ago
        Do you think that it's actually possible to avoid having a group a people that feel they've been cheated somehow?
        jakelazaroff 3y ago
        No, but I don’t really see what that has to do with anything.
mulmen 3y ago
90 days is a long time. Imagine a recent college graduate moving cross country to a new city in search of work. They are unlikely to have resources to live for 90 days if the cops seize all their cash. The cops can get a warrant. If they can’t convince a judge then they don’t need to seize anything. The police serve us, not the other way around.
- ModernMech 3y ago
  Local police bar near me has a sign above the entry that says “brothers before others”. They know who they serve. Seems to be themselves.
  - chefandy 3y ago
    There's also a big hierarchy once they get into the others territory, and it's usually in lockstep with socioeconomic status.
empyrrhicist 3y ago
Sounds like a nice incentive to charge people with crimes they didn't commit...
- brewdad 3y ago
  That would still be an improvement over today where one never needs to be charged with a crime at all and only the stack of cash has a right to defend itself in court.
masklinn 3y ago
> Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime I think you are slightly confused. Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime (hence civil asset forfeiture, rather than criminal asset forfeiture), and the government charges the property itself, the owner is a third party claimant.
- bhelkey 3y ago
  I believe 'should' is the operative word in that comment. They don't claim the world works that way but that it should.
- abigail95 3y ago
  The argument being made is that the structure of the government in the USA defines persons and effects as both being part of the 4A with the same standard of protection against unreasonable search and seizure. The language of the clause means you can't disconnect persons, houses, papers, and effects. People are secure in their persons, their houses, their effects. It's not a weird quirk of some conflicting criminal/civil law. It's part of the document that binds all other laws. Making people a third party to their effects means you could also do that to their person, which is complete nonsense. > Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime But it certainly does require suspicion of wrongdoing. You can't just walk up and take something from someone just because you don't charge them.
AmVess 3y ago
CAF abuse is so widespread that it should be abolished.
lost_tourist 3y ago
I think it shouldn't exist unless the person they take stuff from is convicted, and say a year or two has elapsed, before anything in a cache has to be returned to them, and returned immediately if they are proven guilty.
petedrexel 3y ago
Under the guise of "protecting and serving". A lot of these guys are the bad guys and having a badge doesn't change that.

wahnfrieden 3y ago

The money is often used on personal expenditures like a new F-350 truck for personal use, commemorative Super Bowl badges, or premium salmon-jerky dogfood (actual examples from Georgia). Most seized money does not even get put into a general fund for budget-based reallocation and is left up to discretionary "slush fund" use.

bsder 3y ago

The "proper" solution is that any property, cash, fines, etc. produced by the "criminal justice" system goes only to victims and anything extra should always go into a fund that gets returned directly to the citizens. It doesn't go into a budget. It doesn't fund anything else. Anything collected goes to victims or it goes back to the people. This would stop ALL of the perverse incentives.

maxbond 3y ago
Not quite all, the arbitrary exercise of power is itself an incentive. You can use it to intimidate people or to punish people you don't have the evidence to prosecute (which is to say, those with the presumption of innocence). That would help a ton though.
Gibbon1 3y ago
After thinking of this exact thing for maybe 30 years I think all fines, etc should be turned over to the Social Security Administration. Advantage something like 98% of the money transferred to SS goes right back out the door.
- kuboble 3y ago
  Where I live we have the electricity bill system that kind of works that way. The idea is that let us say the normal price of electricity would be e.g. 10c / kwH. To incentivize people to use less electricity we charge 20c/ but the extra 10c go to the fund which at the end of the year is split evenly between all electricity consumers. So basically everyone pays 20c x consumption -10c x (average consumption).
  - mulmen 3y ago
    So your suggestion is that the cops should seize everyone’s property then reallocate it at years end?
    - kuboble 3y ago
      No. I'm just pointing out a working system where there is a negative financial incentive used to police the population behavior without the problem caused by making it a profit for whoever creates the policy.
      - mulmen 3y ago
        We don’t need financial incentives in law enforcement. We need to lock up thieves regardless of their attire.
- mulmen 3y ago
  Nope. CAF is theft. Reallocating the ill got gains to something you like doesn’t make it right. SSA is worth funding on its own. We shouldn’t need to arbitrarily steal from people to fund it. And we certainly shouldn’t leave SSA funding up to the police. We have fundamental concepts like equal representation and equal treatment under the law that clearly show CAF to be wrong.
  - maxbond 3y ago
    Still a good idea for eg parking tickets (I don't think they meant to offer a defence of CAF).
asveikau 3y ago
Victims of crime should not be given special powers. If anything, their biased position makes them less able to understand that the accused has rights, should be evaluated impartially, are presumed innocent, and shouldn't be subject to unfair punishment if proven guilty. I'm really tired of seeing internet commentary on "tough on crime" attitudes where people think victims are basically judge and jury, possibly omniscient, and their hurt and revenge fantasies should decide policy for millions of unrelated people, supersedes the needs of everybody else, like our need to have an impartial justice system and prevent wrongful conviction. But getting back to your comment, if you want to know where the "perverse incentive" is in your proposal, it creates incentive for someone to falsely present themselves as a victim of a crime.

willcipriano 3y ago

Nope, here are the rules: https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-4/ https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-4/ No time limit nonsense, get a warrant. Charge them with a crime. That's the law no matter what the idiots running courthouses in this country think, your precedent has no power here.

readthenotes1 3y ago
It's more like: any assets taken by civil asset forfeiture should fund civics classes so that the people that are having their property stolen know just how anti-American that is.
- pydry 3y ago
  I think they know. If you polled the country a tiny fraction would say that they think it's a good thing.
  - tremon 3y ago
    It depends on how you frame the question. Asking "Should the police be allowed to seize large amounts of cash from a suspicious-looking (white guy/black guy/latino/hobo/terrorist/banker/politician)" will most likely get you a "yes" answer, as long as you pick the right target for your audience.
- deprecative 3y ago
  Civil forfeiture is a foundational part of the American way. We traded in humans at the start of our country. That has never stopped. Instead of being African Americans (or Black people generally) in current reality it's... our Black communities who we target and throw in prison which is the only exception. Then look at Capitalism. Exploiting labor to drain any opportunity of wealth building from the working class and transferring it to those with wealth. People have this twisted idea that America is a moral or ethical place. It's not. We live in a toxic culture and it has always been and it will continue to be. There is no escape.
3y ago

Sohcahtoa82 3y ago

CAF shouldn't be happening. Period. The government suspects someone of committing a crime? File charges and bring them to court. At the very least, CAF should require a warrant. Cops should not be able to seize assets as part of a typical traffic stop. I just can't see how CAF has survived so long without being ruled a violation of our Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures.

RhodesianHunter 3y ago
People seem to think the police exist to enforce laws and justice. The police exist to maintain and protect existing power structures, including the police themselves. A lot starts making more sense in that context.
- mulmen 3y ago
  The police should exist to enforce law and justice. This prevents mob rule. You are correct that police do not currently serve this purpose.
  - jakelazaroff 3y ago
    The police do prevent "mob rule" today. They use violence to keep a minority of wealthy people atop a social hierarchy. When the "mob" below acts up, they violently quash them. Like, think of any mass social protest movement. Who is the primary "boots-on-the-ground" opposition? It is always the police. It will always be the police. That's what they're there for.
    - postalrat 3y ago
      Do you think that it's actually possible to avoid having a group a people that feel they've been cheated somehow?
      - jakelazaroff 3y ago
        No, but I don’t really see what that has to do with anything.

mulmen 3y ago

90 days is a long time. Imagine a recent college graduate moving cross country to a new city in search of work. They are unlikely to have resources to live for 90 days if the cops seize all their cash. The cops can get a warrant. If they can’t convince a judge then they don’t need to seize anything. The police serve us, not the other way around.

ModernMech 3y ago
Local police bar near me has a sign above the entry that says “brothers before others”. They know who they serve. Seems to be themselves.
- chefandy 3y ago
  There's also a big hierarchy once they get into the others territory, and it's usually in lockstep with socioeconomic status.

empyrrhicist 3y ago

Sounds like a nice incentive to charge people with crimes they didn't commit...

brewdad 3y ago
That would still be an improvement over today where one never needs to be charged with a crime at all and only the stack of cash has a right to defend itself in court.

masklinn 3y ago

> Civil forfeiture should have a time boundary. If police seize your property, they should have 90 days to indite you with a crime I think you are slightly confused. Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime (hence civil asset forfeiture, rather than criminal asset forfeiture), and the government charges the property itself, the owner is a third party claimant.

bhelkey 3y ago
I believe 'should' is the operative word in that comment. They don't claim the world works that way but that it should.
abigail95 3y ago
The argument being made is that the structure of the government in the USA defines persons and effects as both being part of the 4A with the same standard of protection against unreasonable search and seizure. The language of the clause means you can't disconnect persons, houses, papers, and effects. People are secure in their persons, their houses, their effects. It's not a weird quirk of some conflicting criminal/civil law. It's part of the document that binds all other laws. Making people a third party to their effects means you could also do that to their person, which is complete nonsense. > Civil asset forfeiture does not require any crime But it certainly does require suspicion of wrongdoing. You can't just walk up and take something from someone just because you don't charge them.

AmVess 3y ago

CAF abuse is so widespread that it should be abolished.

lost_tourist 3y ago

I think it shouldn't exist unless the person they take stuff from is convicted, and say a year or two has elapsed, before anything in a cache has to be returned to them, and returned immediately if they are proven guilty.

petedrexel 3y ago

Under the guise of "protecting and serving". A lot of these guys are the bad guys and having a badge doesn't change that.