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Originally Posted by Zeraph
Shrug. I understand the need for the law. Hard to say if its wrong or not. If you have 24k legit you should be able to prove where you got it easily.
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Not necessarily. Besides, why should you have to prove that your money is legitimate, why shouldn't the government have to prove that it's illegitimate. THATS THE PROBLEM. The government is putting the burden of proof on the individual and taking his money/property if he cannot prove his innocence, as well as the innocence of his assets. The burden of proof for seizure of assets should NOT be on the individual, it should be on the government. If the government cannot prove wrongdoing, than the government should not be allowed to take any action.
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Originally Posted by opus123
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None of the information in these links prove, however, that the person who currently has the money committed any crime, or was party to a crime. I've read the abstract of the first link (I'm not paying for the full version) but nothing there says when the money changed hands from whomever committed the crime, to an innocent 3rd party. I've read the snopes link before, and I think it tends to support my position a bit more than yours.
Think about it for a second. If a person who did use said money in a crime, then spent it to buy something from an innocent person (and yes there are legitimate things that costs $20k or more , new cars, and some newer model used cars are examples) why should that money be seized from an innocent person? I could see seizing the purchase from the person involved in the drug crime but ONLY after he's been convicted beyond a reasonable doubt from the from the drug crime, AND that said asset is proven beyond a reasonable doubt to have been bought with drug money. Without such proof I oppose forfeiture.
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Originally Posted by opus123
This last article talks about a drug sniffing dog that was so good, it detected drugs directly on $9,000 in a briefcase. The sad thing was that the amounts were not high enough to persuade a judge to think that the drugs had made direct contact with the money, so the money was returned.
http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/p...cre_notes.html |
I think that the right decision was made if the money was returned to him. The government didn't adequately prove that the money that they seized was the proceeds of a crime, or that it was used in the furtherance of a crime. If they don't prove that they shouldn't be allowed to take $0.01 of that money in my opinion. So I agree with the judge, as I'm strongly against taking people's assets without proof beyond a reasonable doubt of crime, and connection of said asset to the crime for which the person was convicted.
IOW, I think that that aspect of the RICO laws should be repealed or overturned because it allows for unreasonable seizure.
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Originally Posted by opus123
The police constantly test clothing for cocaine and other drugs, why not test money as well ?
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How often do your give your clothes change hands? Seriously, do you buy your clothes used as the norm? I'm betting that the vast majority of the money that you handle over the course of your lifetime, has been spent by someone else before it reached you. Most people buy their clothes new, but most money in the system has been in the possession, and used by someone else before it got to you. See the difference here between money and clothes in this situation? It's possible that you go to an ATM and get money for something and spend the money the same day, how often do you do that with your own clothes?
I
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Originally Posted by opus123
suspect however, that the truck driver was suffering from lack of sleep and maybe was acting odd in some way so as to incur the search, or perhaps they randomly searched his truck, but the fact that he volunteered the money before it was found could be either quick thinking on his part or perhaps he is innocent. The sad part is the long backlog on CSI chemical testing and the trucker might not get his money back for awhile.
Anyway, I don't know anyone in the police field anymore, so perhaps times have changed and I'll conceed the point if it is no longer done.
Jonathan
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I think that the truck driver was stupid to voluntarily let the police search his vehicle. However his stupidity doesn't justify taking his money without proving beyond a reasonable doubt that he's both a criminal, AND, that the money being seized was used in the commission of a crime, or was the proceeds from a crime. Taking it under any circumstance less that that level of proof is nothing more than armed robbery.