Civil Asset Forfeiture

In the United States “civil forfeiture" is a legal procedure which might be brought during or after criminal accusations are recorded in the court. It is a court proceeding recorded against a property or against a person which allows law enforcement to take away cash and or property. Based on the article End of Forfeiture (2017), 87% of federal forfeitures were not criminals but civil, the government didn’t have to convict or charge anyone to take the property. Once the U.S. Lawyer's Office gets a referral from a seizing organization of a seized resource case, that office has 90 days to either document a civil legal case or incorporate the seized resource in a criminal arraignment and name it for criminal Forfeiture. On the off chance that a civil case is not documented within those 90 days, the CAFRA "capital punishment" will keep the United States from continuously recording a civil Forfeiture case. If the advantage is incorporated into a prosecution and the respondent is later vindicated or has a conviction turned around to offer, the property can't be surrendered. Thus, numerous U.S. prosecutors record a suspicious civil forfeiture activity and incorporate the property for criminal forfeiture in an arraignment (Weld, n.d, 2011.).

Even though civil forfeiture is a practice that happens all around the United States, it is a system that many say the police are able to abuse for their own profit. There have been numerous cases where many individuals have been locked in legal battles with the United States government trying to prove that their assets are indeed innocent and not involved with any crimes. Many feel that the civil forfeiture is a form of “policing for profit” especially since many of the assets are used under the Equitable Sharing Program. (Crawford) police can stop motorists, possibly under the pretext of a minor traffic infraction, and "analyze" the intentions of motorists by assessing nervousness, and request permission to search the vehicle without a warrant,

In pursuit of the war on drugs, changes had been made to the nature of law enforcement and prosecution. Law enforcement have now been more empower with these new policies seem to have diminish civilians rights, such policies gave law enforcement power to violate third and fourth amendment. “Using general warrants, British soldiers were allowed to enter private homes, confiscate what they found, and often keep the bounty for themselves. The policy was reminiscent of today’s civil asset forfeiture laws.”(Balko, R, 2013) The civil asset forfeiture statute is an asset seizure of possessions that are alleged proceeds from criminal activity. Criminal activity over the decades had developed and more organized. Criminals would get their mandatory minimum sentence and the crime enterprise would just continue, but legislators’ passed a statute to dismantle entire criminal organizations and it’s known as Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations or R.I.C.O. Passed in 1970 it was used in the prosecution of Sicilian mafia in New York city. Instead of prosecuting criminals individually such as solders and capo, it was effective in shutting down entire criminal organizations. R.I.C.O statute appeared to be effective on the war on drugs. The combination of the two policies provided incentives to battle the war on drug. Assets were disseminated among various law enforcement departments, putting more officers on the streets, obtaining newer police vehicles and countless equipment for law

According to Linda Monk in The Words We Live By, colonists resented the British practice of general warrants. This allowed British agents to search anywhere they wanted and seize anything they pleased. Colonials resented this practice to the point that upon securing independence from Britain, eight states prohibited general warrants in their state constitutions. The areas to be discussed are what constitutes a reasonable expectation of privacy, reasonable searches and seizures, the requirement to establish probable cause, and when has the court ruled to the contrary.

Within the Criminal Justice system, comes a structure of both practices as well as organizations that main role is to uphold not only social jurisdiction, but to discourage and diminish criminal activity. The Criminal Justice system also sanctions those who violate the laws of the land with penalties and reintegration of the criminals into society. In the United States, our policy has been guided by the 1967 President 's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, which issued a ground-breaking report 'The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society ' (President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice [Presidents Commission], 1967).

Modern American CAF derives it’s roots from the policies used by police and prosecutors during the time of alcohol prohibition. Law enforcement during early 20th century would often use civil asset forfeiture against the cars, guns, money, and other property of the people who were busted smuggling liquor. Although alcohol prohibition died 80 years ago with the passage of the 21st and the repeal of the 18th amendments, the most common usage of CAF still lies within the realm of enforcing prohibition laws. Civil asset forfeiture is primarily used to fight drug crimes, especially narcotics trafficking (Van Den Berg, 873). Since the passage of the 1970 Comprehensive Drug Reform Act civil asset forfeiture has been expanded by law enforcement in order to meet the additional billions of dollars of strain that the war on drugs places on the budgets of city and county law enforcement agencies around the nation (Ann- Yu Chi, 1639).

In your grievance filed at Browning Unit, you claim your release credits were taken after your scheduled parole certification was complete. You further assert that TCU did not forward your forfeiture packet within timeframes. You are requesting to have your ERCs restored.

This year (2015) civil forfeiture laws have come under scrutiny in the state of Oklahoma. These laws are what enable law enforcement to confiscate money and property without the need to charge first with a crime. State senator Kyle Loveless aims to revise the forfeiture laws so that criminal charges become a requirement before any seizing takes place. A measure which the Department of Justice (a federal executive branch) has already taken. Currently authorities can seize assets under simple suspicion of criminal involvement and any unchallenged funds are solely directed to aid law enforcement objectives. It is this loose end in the system where senator Loveless points out the corruption committed by authorities utilizing said funds

Civil asset forfeitures, mainly from highway interdictions, have resulted in the seizure of at least 2.5 billion dollars in assets and currency (Stop and Seize). 2.5 billion dollars seized from criminal enterprise is great news, but 2.5 billion dollars has not been seized from criminals, instead it has been confiscated from a combination of innocent and guilty persons. In some cases entire businesses may be subject to forfeiture based on the actions of a single employee. Individual citizens have complained of being forced to turn over their property based on weak criminal suspicions under threat of dubious charges (Reid).

The City of Richland has a new training center, new Dodge Chargers and new a police station which cost $4.1 million. The purchases were paid for with civil forfeitures of assets and money detained through traffic stops of what was claimed to be alleged drug traffickers on Interstate 20. Civil libertarians question the constitutionality of civil forfeiture, which has become a key part of revenue for state and local law enforcement agencies nationwide.Under the laws of many states, citizens can be deprived of their property or even cash if police merely suspect the owners to be involved in criminal involvements. Since 2006, Richland’s four-officer interdiction team has obtained a vast forfeiture numbers. In 2014, the team seized five hundred

Claim: The United States Government should reform the Civil Forfeiture law because citizens need to feel protected in their own country.

Most people, when they hear the word “crime,” think about street crime or violent crime such as murder, rape, theft, or drugs. However, there is another type of crime that has cost people their life savings, investors’ billions of dollars, and has had significant impacts of multiple lives; it is called white collar crime. The Federal Bureau of Investigation defines white collar crime as

White collar crime is a serious issue in the United States. White-collar crime is “a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation” (cornell.edu). Examples of such offenses include bribery, credit card fraud, insurance fraud, bank fraud, blackmail, extortion, forgery, securities fraud, tax evasion, embezzlement, repair scams, Ponzi and pyramid schemes. These non-violent crimes are responsible for an estimated $250 billion to $1 trillion in economic damages each year (Martinez). Individuals who commit white collar crimes have an increased likelihood to experience injustice compared to those who commit a street crime as noted in multiple studies detailed in various scholarly articles. Also, street criminals have a greater chance of getting caught in their wrongdoings versus white-collar criminals. Those who commit white collar crime make their decisions based on the philosophy or idea that their actions have low risk and a high reward. We face a dilemma in the United States because white-collar criminals are treated with minimal, inequitable punishment due to their social status, whereas the street criminals are treated with the correct, impartial punishment.

Imagine the police arresting a house. The owner of this house is not in trouble, just their house. This is asset forfeiture at its finest. Asset forfeiture has a wide range of main points to discuss as well as a numerous amount of sub-topics. This form of government control makes a very strong point about how powerful the government has become and how easy it is for them to over-power American’s today. On the other hand, it shows how dedicated law enforcement is to decreasing the crime rates in multiple areas of the country. With that said, there are several viewpoints on asset forfeiture and how it affects Americans as a whole. A few of these viewpoints is that civil asset forfeiture comes with the implication that police just take

Over the past two years, corporate America has endured a plethora of fraudulent acts committed by those of high status within their respective corporations, most of which involve internal fraud. Internal fraud has two main aspects, misappropriation of assets and fraudulent financial reporting, with the focus of this discussion lying within the former. Misappropriation of assets is defined as fraud for personal gain. It is the most common type of fraud found among employees and frequently includes theft of cash and inventory.