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At what point did sending cash become criminal such that the police felt justified to seize it? Are we just fully ignoring the Constitution now or?

vlovich123 2y ago
Not sure why you’re being downvoted. It’s one thing for it to be against policy and FedEx to be seizing it (which itself would unlikely to be a legal action vs returning it and fining the recipient), a totally different matter for the police to be doing it.
- deleted 2y ago
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- onemoretime69 2y ago
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- eatmebtches 2y ago
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- eatmebtches 2y ago
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- rustroxz 2y ago
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- rustroxz 2y ago
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- unethical_ban 2y ago
  They're not being downvoted. Someone (I'm assuming it's only one person) must have gotten a downvote and now has spun up a bunch of new accounts to complain about bot armies and astroturfing. Moreover, they're complaining that the tone here is too pro-police, despite what I see is a majority of comments being critical of asset forfeiture.
tbrownaw 2y ago
> Are we just fully ignoring the Constitution now The feds do quite a lot these days that isn't actually part of their enumerated powers.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > The feds The plaintiff "is pursuing a class action lawsuit against the state of Indiana." No evidence of any Feds being involved.
- DannyBee 2y ago
  The feds were not part of this - it was state proceedings.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> Are we just fully ignoring the Constitution now or? The law, not the Constitution. Nothing in the Constitution would prevent the Congress from banning mailing cash.
- vlovich123 2y ago
  It’s not quite so clear cut. From Wikipedia: > These attempts at limiting the content of the mail were upheld by the Supreme Court, but in the 20th century, the Court took a more assertive approach in striking down postal laws which limited free expression, particularly as it related to political materials.[7][8] The First Amendment thus provided a check on the Postal Power. And SCOTUS these days also tends to equate cash as a form of political speech. Of course mailing cash is a bit different than mailing political materials but you could make the case that it’s part of a political organizing campaign or payment for political materials. And mailing cash itself through the USPS is actually perfectly legal as long as it’s for a legal purpose.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > SCOTUS these days also tends to equate cash as a form of political speech No, it does not.
    - vlovich123 2y ago
      What an eloquent rebuttal. I’m convinced. But for someone more skeptical, maybe elaborate how that wasn’t in effect the ruling in citizens united?
      - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
        > how that wasn’t in effect the ruling in citizens united? Donating to a candidate or sponsoring an ad that says things about a candidate are protected political speech, requiring a strict standard for the Congress to regulate. Citizens reasoned that if that’s true individually it should be true for a group, on the basis—in part—of freedom of assembly, whether that be an advocacy group or corporation. Money = speech is a colloquial but wrong summary. Money donated to a candidate or used to buy speech is protected, whether done individually or as a group. The simplest resolution is to read the opinion. (Logically speaking, it makes sense. It’s just absurd to construct the freedom of assembly as automatically making all rights natural persons enjoy commutative.)
AngryData 2y ago
Its been like that since the drug war. Any large amount of cash is seized whenever it is found and considered the procedes of criminal activities unless you can definitively prove that that exact pile of cash had zero involvement in any past crime or future crime.
DannyBee 2y ago
Lawyer here (but FWIW, i donate to IJ so, uh, not exactly on the government's side here): Take what i'm about to say as a description of the process rather than any support for it :) So, it's not quite that. Here, they are claiming it because a dog "alerted" on the package, so they then claim it's related to criminal activity. regardless of whether they find actual drugs in it. This part: "Even though Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department dogs alerted handlers to the smell of drugs in the box, no contraband could be found once it was opened." The first part is why they were involved and allowed to seize it. The second is mostly irrelevant, legally (whether it should be or not). You don't have to prove it contained drugs to prove it was proceeds of a crime or otherwise part of criminal activity. This part is actually right, whether it gets used in an insane fashion or not. This is civil and not criminal, so the standard is not "proof beyond a reasonable doubt". They file a suit against the money itself. It ends up with a funny case title like "United States v. An Article Consisting of 50,000 Cardboard Boxes More or Less, Each Containing One Pair of Clacker Balls," or "United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins" (both real, but federal seizures. If a state seizes it, it's like State of Indiana v., and often less funny) Even if the person is not charged with a crime, if they successfully argue the money itself is criminal proceeds or was involved in criminal activity, they can confiscate it. So, it's not sending cash that enables them to seize it. It's whether the money is used in criminal activity. The thing that enables them to be involved is that the dog alerted to it. Now, for as much bullshit as exists in dog alerts, in this case, fedex often goes through about 100k packages an hour in this site, and they have seized 100 of them in the past year. That's a really really small percent of the packages.
- mh- 2y ago
  > Now, for as much bullshit as exists in dog alerts, in this case, fedex often goes through about 100k packages an hour in this site, and they have seized 100 of them in the past year. Such a vanishingly small percentage that it suggests some sort of parallel construction. Surely the dog (and handler) aren't just standing there all year waiting to hit on a package..
  - DannyBee 2y ago

vlovich123 2y ago

Not sure why you’re being downvoted. It’s one thing for it to be against policy and FedEx to be seizing it (which itself would unlikely to be a legal action vs returning it and fining the recipient), a totally different matter for the police to be doing it.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
onemoretime69 2y ago
[flagged]
eatmebtches 2y ago
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eatmebtches 2y ago
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rustroxz 2y ago
[flagged]
rustroxz 2y ago
[flagged]
unethical_ban 2y ago
They're not being downvoted. Someone (I'm assuming it's only one person) must have gotten a downvote and now has spun up a bunch of new accounts to complain about bot armies and astroturfing. Moreover, they're complaining that the tone here is too pro-police, despite what I see is a majority of comments being critical of asset forfeiture.

tbrownaw 2y ago

> Are we just fully ignoring the Constitution now The feds do quite a lot these days that isn't actually part of their enumerated powers.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> The feds The plaintiff "is pursuing a class action lawsuit against the state of Indiana." No evidence of any Feds being involved.
DannyBee 2y ago
The feds were not part of this - it was state proceedings.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

> Are we just fully ignoring the Constitution now or? The law, not the Constitution. Nothing in the Constitution would prevent the Congress from banning mailing cash.

vlovich123 2y ago
It’s not quite so clear cut. From Wikipedia: > These attempts at limiting the content of the mail were upheld by the Supreme Court, but in the 20th century, the Court took a more assertive approach in striking down postal laws which limited free expression, particularly as it related to political materials.[7][8] The First Amendment thus provided a check on the Postal Power. And SCOTUS these days also tends to equate cash as a form of political speech. Of course mailing cash is a bit different than mailing political materials but you could make the case that it’s part of a political organizing campaign or payment for political materials. And mailing cash itself through the USPS is actually perfectly legal as long as it’s for a legal purpose.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > SCOTUS these days also tends to equate cash as a form of political speech No, it does not.
  - vlovich123 2y ago
    What an eloquent rebuttal. I’m convinced. But for someone more skeptical, maybe elaborate how that wasn’t in effect the ruling in citizens united?
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > how that wasn’t in effect the ruling in citizens united? Donating to a candidate or sponsoring an ad that says things about a candidate are protected political speech, requiring a strict standard for the Congress to regulate. Citizens reasoned that if that’s true individually it should be true for a group, on the basis—in part—of freedom of assembly, whether that be an advocacy group or corporation. Money = speech is a colloquial but wrong summary. Money donated to a candidate or used to buy speech is protected, whether done individually or as a group. The simplest resolution is to read the opinion. (Logically speaking, it makes sense. It’s just absurd to construct the freedom of assembly as automatically making all rights natural persons enjoy commutative.)

AngryData 2y ago

Its been like that since the drug war. Any large amount of cash is seized whenever it is found and considered the procedes of criminal activities unless you can definitively prove that that exact pile of cash had zero involvement in any past crime or future crime.

DannyBee 2y ago

Lawyer here (but FWIW, i donate to IJ so, uh, not exactly on the government's side here): Take what i'm about to say as a description of the process rather than any support for it :) So, it's not quite that. Here, they are claiming it because a dog "alerted" on the package, so they then claim it's related to criminal activity. regardless of whether they find actual drugs in it. This part: "Even though Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department dogs alerted handlers to the smell of drugs in the box, no contraband could be found once it was opened." The first part is why they were involved and allowed to seize it. The second is mostly irrelevant, legally (whether it should be or not). You don't have to prove it contained drugs to prove it was proceeds of a crime or otherwise part of criminal activity. This part is actually right, whether it gets used in an insane fashion or not. This is civil and not criminal, so the standard is not "proof beyond a reasonable doubt". They file a suit against the money itself. It ends up with a funny case title like "United States v. An Article Consisting of 50,000 Cardboard Boxes More or Less, Each Containing One Pair of Clacker Balls," or "United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins" (both real, but federal seizures. If a state seizes it, it's like State of Indiana v., and often less funny) Even if the person is not charged with a crime, if they successfully argue the money itself is criminal proceeds or was involved in criminal activity, they can confiscate it. So, it's not sending cash that enables them to seize it. It's whether the money is used in criminal activity. The thing that enables them to be involved is that the dog alerted to it. Now, for as much bullshit as exists in dog alerts, in this case, fedex often goes through about 100k packages an hour in this site, and they have seized 100 of them in the past year. That's a really really small percent of the packages.

mh- 2y ago
> Now, for as much bullshit as exists in dog alerts, in this case, fedex often goes through about 100k packages an hour in this site, and they have seized 100 of them in the past year. Such a vanishingly small percentage that it suggests some sort of parallel construction. Surely the dog (and handler) aren't just standing there all year waiting to hit on a package..
- DannyBee 2y ago