CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE

Despite the Fifth Amendment's assertion that no person "be deprived of . . . property, without due process of law," the Supreme Court ruled in 1974 that property could be seized and sold by the government without any arrest, conviction, or due process. Under the idea that property itself can be guilty, police may now take your property without convicting or even arresting you, leaving you to prove it has no connection to a crime.

• Forfeiture laws mean profits for the police seizing assets. Despite laws in several states diverting forfeiture treasure to schools, law enforcement agencies remain greedy. Since 1993, for example, Missouri law enforcement has earned $41 million in seized assets and handed over less that $12 million to schools.   

  Source: Harper's article (link provided below). 

• Not only do victims of asset seizing under forfeiture laws have to prove their own innocence, but they have only ten days to do so. If they miss the deadline, they lose their property. [also see, "This is Your Bill of Rights, On Drugs," by Graham Boyd]   

  Source: Harper's article. 

• Asset forfeiture laws were originally designed to punish large-scale drug traffickers and organized criminals who got rich off of their crimes. One nasty side effect of the laws, however, has been that cops now decide which cases to investigate based not on the amount of drugs involved or the possible danger to society, but on the profitability of investigating a case. Because organized criminals are better at covering their tracks than low-level dealers, this often means that the more serious crimes are ignored by cops in favor of the less serious. Read the Forfeiture Briefing Paper of the Drug Policy Foundation to find out more.   

  Source: Drug Policy Foundation "Forfeiture Briefing Paper (link provided above).

• President Clinton recently signed into law the Civil Asset Forfeiture Act of 2000, which brings some much needed reform to asset forfeiture laws. The new law grants people whose assets have been seized the right to legal counsel, as well as providing for the temporary return of seized assets to their owners while investigation is pending, if hardship can be proven. 

  Source: Federal legislation page of www.fear.org, the website of F.E.A. R., "Forfeiture Endangers American Lives (link provided)." The page also includes a link to the full text of the bill.