Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. on Friday barred local and state police from using federal law to seize cash, cars and other property without proving that a crime occurred.
Holder’s action represents the most sweeping check on police power to confiscate personal property since the seizures began three decades ago as part of the war on drugs.
Since 2008, thousands of local and state police agencies have made more than 55,000 seizures of cash and property worth $3 billion under a civil asset forfeiture program at the Justice Department called Equitable Sharing.
The program has enabled local and state police to make seizures and then have them “adopted” by federal agencies, which share in the proceeds. The program allowed police departments and drug task forces to keep up to 80 percent of the proceeds of the adopted seizures, with the rest going to federal agencies.
“With this new policy, effective immediately, the Justice Department is taking an important step to prohibit federal agency adoptions of state and local seizures, except for public safety reasons,” Holder said in a statement.
Holder’s decision allows some limited exceptions, including illegal firearms, ammunition, explosives and property associated with child pornography, a small fraction of the total. This would eliminate virtually all cash and vehicle seizures made by local and state police from the program.
While police can continue to make seizures under their own state laws, the federal program was easy to use and required most of the proceeds from the seizures to go to local and state police departments. Many states require seized proceeds to go into the general fund.
A Justice official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss the attorney general’s motivation, said Holder “also believes that the new policy will eliminate any possibility that the adoption process might unintentionally incentivize unnecessary stops and seizures.”
Holder’s decision follows a Washington Post investigation published in September that found that police have made cash seizures worth almost $2.5 billion from motorists and others without search warrants or indictments since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
The Post found that local and state police routinely pulled over drivers for minor traffic infractions, pressed them to agree to warrantless searches and seized large amounts of cash without evidence of wrongdoing. The law allows such seizures and forces the owners to prove their property was legally acquired in order to get it back.
Police spent the seizure proceeds with little oversight, in some cases buying luxury cars, high-powered weapons and military-grade gear such as armored cars, according to an analysis of Justice Department data obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests.
News of Holder’s decision stunned advocates who have for a long time unsuccessfully sought to reverse civil asset forfeiture laws, arguing that they undermine core American values, such as property rights and due process.
Holder must not have been getting his cut.
ReplyDeleteNow, everybody has to rally their state legislatures to get inequitable laws off the books at the state level. This travesty, which is nothing but piracy on the high seas--oops, highways--HAS to stop!
I must give credit for doing right to Mr.Holder.Asking that he order money returned would probably be too much. He DID do right for once,give credit.
ReplyDelete10 billion dollars and 10 thousand felonies too late..
ReplyDeleteI applaud Holders efforts to correct a practice that is obviously wrong and illegal, but exactly how and when did the federal government acquire jurisdiction over local and state law enforcement agencies, or any other state agency for that matter? Because it
ReplyDeleteclearly was not acquired from the US Constitution, which specifically limits federal laws and regulations to areas (real estate) under federal government jurisdiction (including the
District of Columbia (DC) and all foreign districts or possessions gained by military conquest or voluntary cession to it by foreign powers. With all other areas (real estate) within the United States (plural term) being under the legal jurisdiction of the State (capitalized) in which they exist. Most of the above, is stated more briefly in the Bill of Rights in an unambiguous 10th Amendment containing only twenty nine well-chosen words.
“The powers not delegated to the United States by
the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the
States respectively, or to the people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equitable_sharing
ReplyDeleteBy virtue of Equitable Sharing, and having a Federal agent present, local cops may seize assets (a house for a minor marijuana bust in one case) for a Federal infraction, despite its being a perfectly legal activity at the local and State level.
We should all be grateful, but how about making this law retroactive? You know GIVE BACK ALL OF THE CASH & PROPERTY STOLEN under the "equitable sharing" law!!
ReplyDeleteEric Holder; about like waving off a fart while leaving a room... it's appreciated, but we would have preferred NO fart to begin with!