OFF THE WIRE
FoxNews.com
States across the country are revising laws that allow police to seize a
person’s cash and property without a conviction, following widespread
complaints about agencies profiteering off such legislation, holdovers
from the “Miami Vice” cocaine era.
Right now, 47 of the 50 states allow so-called civil asset
forfeitures, with New Hampshire set to effectively end such practices,
which allow property and currency to be seized even if it’s only
suspected of being connected to a crime.
The changes in New Hampshire and elsewhere follow
numerous, high-profile cases in which Americans have had their cash and
other assets seized by state- and local-level police agencies without
being convicted and of police departments appearing to aggressively
pursue such cases to fill their coffers.
Among them is the 2013 case in which motorist
Straughn Gorman had $167,000 in cash seized by the Nevada state police,
which suspected him of transporting drugs but only issued him traffic
tickets.
In another highly-publicized case, a small-town
Mississippi police department built a $4.1 million training facility and
bought a fleet of new police cruisers from such forfeitures.
The New Hampshire legislation, which Democratic Gov.
Maggie Hassen has vowed to sign, would essentially require prosecutors
trying to keep assets to first get a conviction, with few exceptions
including a defendant’s death.
And it would require them to present stronger cases
and harder evidence -- phased in the bill as “clear and compelling”
evidence.
“I look forward to signing this bipartisan bill that … maintains drug forfeiture funds,” Hassen said last week.
However, New Hampshire is still involved in a federal
program in which state or local police can transfer seized assets to
the U.S. government, then get back a percentage of the haul.
The Justice Department recently stopped a program
that such agencies appeared to be using to side-step state forfeiture
laws and get back a heft percentage.
However, the department still has its “Equitable
Sharing Program” in which agencies assisting the federal government in
criminal cases can share in some of the seized assets, the agency said
Wednesday.
Maryland, New Mexico and Nebraska have purportedly
restricted their law enforcement agencies from participating in the
federal program.
“New Hampshire would be wise to follow that lead,”
Jason Snead, a Heritage Foundation policy analyst, recently told The
Daily Signal. “Until it does, the impact of (its bill) is likely to be
seriously blunted by law enforcement agencies that have every incentive
to circumvent the new law and little compunction about doing so.”
North Carolina, New Mexico and Nebraska (once its law
takes effect) are the only three states with no state forfeiture
provision.
Michigan, Montana, New Mexico and Florida have recently revised their civil asset forfeiture laws.
In Florida, GOP Gov. Rick Scott recently signed a
bipartisan bill that takes effect in July and will requires law
enforcement agencies to arrest suspects before seizing their property
under civil asset forfeiture laws.
In addition, the agencies will have to pay thousands
in filing fees and bond postings should the owner be found not guilty.
The law also makes recovering the property and related legal fees easier
for the owner.
Cash can still be taken in Florida without an arrest
but cannot be kept unless agencies prove “beyond a reasonable doubt”
that it was connected to a crime.