Path: ...!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: Man contesting Civil Asset Forfeiture gets attorneys' fees
Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2025 19:02:24 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Lines: 61
Message-ID: <1094qk0$1o66$1@dont-email.me>
References: <1094hb9$3vhbp$1@dont-email.me> <1094nlm$3ul8i$2@dont-email.me> <1094o2c$127o$4@dont-email.me> <1094per$3ul8i$3@dont-email.me>
Injection-Date: Mon, 01 Sep 2025 19:02:25 +0000 (UTC)
Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="b2f5e3290cfc503e69d6645f28c05745";
	logging-data="57542"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org";	posting-account="U2FsdGVkX182ql9fyzJZGTK5nideOMB0UikGAI6sr/I="
Cancel-Lock: sha1:afKx8pXKkilcnN0yaHnfnKcJuhg=
X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test77 (Sep 1, 2010)

Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:
>On 2025-09-01 2:18 PM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:

>>>. . .

>>>Tell me this: WHY do the LEOs do civil asset forfeitures in the first
>>>place? Is there any defensible reason for it from a law enforcement
>>>point of view? Why haven't the courts overturned the practice? I have to
>>>assume that people have tried to fight the seizure of their assets and
>>>probably appealed all the way to the Supreme Court.

>>They want to spend the money. It's that simple. They don't need to
>>defend it. The burden of proof is on the owner.

>>Courts, going back to England under common law, refuse to apply any sort
>>of standard of evidence. The cop, with no basis, assumes the property is
>>proceeds of a crime or about to be used in a crime.

>>If courts require no evidence, then you can get away with murder.

>Don't the courts, especially the Supreme Court, see this as the naked 
>property grab that it is? Shouldn't they have the moral sense to see 
>that it's wrong?

There have been isolated victories for justice. There is no case that
generally makes this unconstitutional.

It's also not straightforward as there are multiple potential
constitutional violations, not just one.

1) No legal standard justifying the cop's suspicion to begin with,
leading to everything else

2) Warrantless seizure

3) Warrantless search

4) No probable cause to charge an underlying crime; hell, cops know
nothing about any crime at all

5) In rare instances of a crime charged but it gets dismissed or
acquittal, no instant return of seized property

6) The burden of proof justifying the forfeiture is too low, but every
time I read about one of these, the judge isn't even forcing compliance
with the low burden

7) The entire legal fiction that property can be guilty

8) The shifting of the burden of proof to the owner

9) My personal suspicion that when a crime has been charged, the purpose
lf the forteiture is to deny the defendant his Sixth Amendment right to
counsel of his choice because he can no longer afford an attorney

There are another half dozen related issues that BTR1701 can name that
need to be addressed. Unless and until all are addressed, some aspects
of this will remain.

>. . .