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With civil asset forfeiture, you have to prove your innocence instead of them proving you are guilty. There is another thread on here where many cases of abuse were posted.
You can have this argument. No one is complaining when drug dealers get stuff confiscated. They are complaining when people that have done nothing get things confiscated or when there was an illegal arrest and when found that way, won't give things back.
When someone dealing drugs gets arrested (AND CONVICTED) no one is complaining. Happy? SHeesh.
Convicted is the key word. I realize this is a matter of semantics...but it is an important distinction.
"Private property" is only an illusion in the collectivist State. You have exclusive usage privileges, which can be revoked by the whim of government for failure to obey whatever hurdles you need jump through to exercise your privileges (which were supposed to be protected natural rights). But then people have natural human rights, "citizens" and "subjects" have "privileges". And then again, our "government" was supposed to protect our inalienable natural rights from aggressors by being a retaliatory force, instead it is an institution of initiations of force, aggression, against the individual's natural rights.
Avery, this is not about collecting money in drug busts, this is about the countless cases of people carrying large amounts of cash for whatever reason (traveling, moving across the country, etc) and having it confiscated by law enforcement when no crime has occurred. This is done under pretense of "suspicion", and requires those who had their cash stolen from them to use the legal system to get it back.
Absolutely correct.
This is an interesting article about the situation in Texas, and how our state legislature is attempting to address the problem:
"When police officers pulled Damian Hernandez to the side of the road in Houston, they thought he might be a drug smuggler — or maybe a human trafficker.
There weren’t any drugs, or other human beings, in Hernandez’s car. But there was sand in his trunk. Multiple air fresheners. A little spiral notebook with numbers written inside. And Hernandez had $3,646 in cash.
The sand, a police officer later wrote, might have come from the shoes of an undocumented immigrant. And the air fresheners might have been intended to cover up the smell of illegal narcotics. The notebook could have easily been a ledger of money owed or spent for illicit purposes.
So the officers seized Hernandez’s $3,646, and then sent him on his way.
The police never charged Hernandez with a crime. As documents from the 2014 incident show, they never pursued further investigation, either. Neither party responded to requests for comment about the seizure.
But even though Hernandez wasn’t charged with anything, the Houston police used his $3,646 for their own purposes: purchasing body cameras and other equipment."
It was legal theft. The article notes that it is difficult, once the police cease your property, to get it back again, even if never charged with anything.
Let me discuss some more from the article I linked to.
The article discusses Tenaha, Texas, and how over a few years (2006-2008) some 1000 people, mainly blacks and Hispanics, were stopped and had their assets ceased. It was so bad the ACLU got involved, suing the town, with a settlement eventually reached (including telling the police to stop what they were doing).
Never heard of Tenaha, Texas? Neither have I. It is a far east Texas town (close to the border with Louisiana) consisting, as of 2010, of 1,160 people.
I have no idea how many police officers they had, but they were excellent at their 'job', grabbing 3 million dollars worth of assets during that time frame. Tenaha is blessed with two state highways intersecting in the town.
Many police departments (and sheriff) oppose the Texas legislatures attempt to rein in this legal theft. It is shameful.
That guy from the original article stopped in Houston? With sand in his car? I have been to Galveston many times, and invariably when leaving, and driving through Houston, I had sand in my car from the beach. Am I to be suspected of having had illegals due to sand? I will note that the border is pretty darn far away from Houston.
Government, by definition, is aggression, which is an actual crime. (to anyone but a psychotic, thug, or tyrant) How ironic that a criminal organization gets to define what a crime is when any child knows that aggression is the source of all evil. But that innate understanding of morality is lost once the government gets to "educate" them
Anyway, even for "criminals", seizure of "private property" as a "punishment" is completely immoral and without any foundation in rationality. How have the specific "crimes" been an act of aggression upon another causing them monetary damage? And if the so-called aggressor has caused monetary damage to another, why are they not permitted to pay their restitution however they'd like? "Fines" are completely arbitrary and have nothing to do with restitution to return the victim (often completely fictional and non-existent) to the state prior to the aggression. The State imposes "fines" and confiscates property simply to steal from the people and for no other reason.
Wow. The insane attacks and accusations about what the left believes are fascinating. Hopefully you folks don't actually believe the nonsense you are pedaling.
Here is the reality-this is a bipartisan thing for the most part. Everyone I know hates the civil forfeiture laws. They violate the spirit of our constitution, and most likely they violate the letter of it as well. They have been horiffically abused, and with impunity.
ALL of my liberal friends find them deeply concerning, and most of my conservative ones as well. very few of them defend it.
Civil forfeiture is unamerican in my opinion, and a violation of our constitution in my opinion. I'm hopeful that the supreme court will finally rule definitively on this. If they find its constitutional, then I will continue at the local level to pressure my government to not employ it.
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