"Christmas Came Early..."
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When it's a slow news day, you can typically rely on finding one of two frequently occurring stories: (a) a questionable tasering, or (b) a questionable asset forfeiture:
Silly me -- the "heart of the matter" is instead that country bumpkin sheriffs enjoy "Christmas early" by scoring their first major not-quite-arrest for a not-quite-crime. "Now we're up in the big leagues..." I wonder what they'll spend their not-so-hard-earned money on.
The notions that: (a) asset forfeiture is not a criminal penalty, and (b) that the government can circumvent criminal procedural due process by posing as a civil plaintiff and "suing the money" (or the car or the plane or the jewelry or ...) are among the most obnoxious of civil liberties violations -- and in the era of Kelo v. New London, "administrative" searches, Morse v. Frederick (and, of course, "enemy combatants"), that's saying a lot.
"Christmas came early" indeed.
(Via Fark.)
Christmas came early last year for a new Kimball County [Nebraska] Sheriff's deputy.I used to think that "the heart of matter" was that no person must ever be "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law," and that "due process" clearly means that a forfeiture of non-contraband for an alleged criminal matter be subjected to the criminal process (i.e., proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt).
Deputy Chris Engel, 25, had been on the job just two weeks when a routine traffic stop Dec. 20 turned into the biggest cash seizure the Nebraska county has ever seen.
...
The driver's story didn't add up, Engel said, so he did a little more investigating. In the end, $69,040 in cash was taken from the car. Officials suspect the money is connected to a drug-trafficking operation, he said.
The driver was not arrested -- or even ticketed for going 10 mph over the 75 mph speed limit.
...
Investigators don't know if they will be able to connect the money to a drug operation, Hanson said, but the important work already has been done.
"The big thing is he grabbed 69 (thousand dollars) and took it away from them," Hanson said of the money seized. "That's going right straight to the heart of the matter."
Silly me -- the "heart of the matter" is instead that country bumpkin sheriffs enjoy "Christmas early" by scoring their first major not-quite-arrest for a not-quite-crime. "Now we're up in the big leagues..." I wonder what they'll spend their not-so-hard-earned money on.
The notions that: (a) asset forfeiture is not a criminal penalty, and (b) that the government can circumvent criminal procedural due process by posing as a civil plaintiff and "suing the money" (or the car or the plane or the jewelry or ...) are among the most obnoxious of civil liberties violations -- and in the era of Kelo v. New London, "administrative" searches, Morse v. Frederick (and, of course, "enemy combatants"), that's saying a lot.
"Christmas came early" indeed.
(Via Fark.)
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Posted by Kip on
14 January 2008
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