Civil Forfeiture Now Requires A Criminal Conviction In Montana And New Mexico

Parent Cafe
1

I don’t think this a political issue, or at least not a partisan issue, so hopefully the thread can survive.

After the other thread about the deficiencies of the Supreme Court, isn’t it amazing that civil asset forfeiture has lasted so long, when there cannot possibly be any place for it in a free society?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2015/07/02/civil-forfeiture-now-requires-a-criminal-conviction-in-montana-and-new-mexico/

2

I agree the law was abused. I work in the government and I saw how certain departments used this authority. It was not good.

In my department we need to have a judgment in place before we can seize goods. If we seize goods we do not get to keep them we must sell them at public auction. The process to get a judgment takes over 90 days and we normally do not seize and auction for a significantly longer period than that. In fact we do not seize goods until the debtor has defaulted on a plan to make good on the debt and continues to not pay additional monies due.

3

It’s a good start, hopefully these reforms will spread to other states…

4

I read a scary article about Texas municipalities using this to fund their departments.

5

Now that I’ve opened the Forbes article I realize that I read the 2013 New Yorker piece that was linked.

6

In many placed it was legalized theft.

Years ago the Somerset County (NJ) sheriff used civil forfeiture to steal someone’s property. He sold it on the cheap to a friend. The sheriff ended up committing suicide in Las Vegas after fleeing an arrest warrant

7

Civil forfeiture is used to fund departments in lots of places.

8

Civil asset forfeiture as practiced is so clearly unconstitutional, I can’t believe it hasn’t yet made it to the Supreme Court.