

What the US does with online poker players' seized funds. - noduerme
http://odenton.patch.com/articles/county-police-net-470000-in-online-gambling-seizure#c

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blhack
This is appalling.

In my opinion, the police and/or any governing body should _absolutely not_
have any kind of financial interest in people committing crimes. They're there
to _prevent_ crimes, not profit from them.

Consider speed cameras. What does my local government (Tempe, Arizona) have a
higher interest in: earning revenue from speed cameras, or stopping speeders?
It would cost them money to stop speeders (in the form of lost ticker
revenue). If they keep people speeding, they keep collecting money.

Any fines or seized funds should be given back to the community in the form of
a tax rebate, not kept by the governing body as a financial incentive.

(This is a financial incentive for the community overall, and I understand
that this is also a problem. However, I feel like giving money back to those
you supposedly committed the crime against [the people] is better than the
alternative)

~~~
nathanb
So if we posit that the money shouldn't go to the police or the government in
general, where _should_ it go?

~~~
there
schools, like the lotto.

~~~
mquander
I would point out that by sending lottery money to schools, we're (to some
degree) incentivizing schools to produce mathematically illiterate people.

One might say the same for sending criminals' money to schools.

~~~
uxp
I would like to see some evidence behind this, as the argument is a straw man
in my opinion.

In my state, taxes collected on Alcohol and Tobacco are both sent into the
pool marked for education, yet we have the lowest smoking rate in the country
and are among the 5 states with the lowest number of drinkers. With your
logic, the only thing I can attribute to the statistical numbers is a poor
education system because not enough people drink or smoke, which indirectly
makes the education system worse and fails to teach people to smoke and drink
in order to get a better education.

I'm sorry. This just doesn't make sense. Education systems don't "profit" from
the few alcoholics and few smokers here. Claiming that taxes from lotteries or
gambling will incentivize schools into failing to teach children to count or
be responsible with money is way too far fetched for me to grasp. The time
frame from when a child is in school learning math to when they are legally
able to buy a scratch card at the corner gas station is too far apart. If you
have some evidence that shows that I am wrong, please let me know.

On the other side of the coin, with this article, the ones that are receiving
the money taken during drug busts or in this case online gambling ring busts
are the ones that end up with the money. It's not laundered through every
different department before it hits the city wallet, usually weeks later, not
years or even decades.

~~~
mquander
I more or less agree with you. My original comment was sort of tongue-in-cheek
:-) I've heard other people make that same proposition with apparent
sincerity, though.

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jameskilton
So how much money would they get if online gambling were legal and taxed. I
would bet it's a TON more.

But we're Americans. We can't think further than 3 seconds into the future.
Thanks for stealing my poker money guys, you're really looking out for the
people.

~~~
gamble
They (the police) would get nothing if gambling was legal. Gambling revenue
goes into the general fund and typically offsets tax cuts or increased
spending in some other area. Police departments only benefit when a crime is
committed, because they can seize property without losing any of their already
allocated funding.

~~~
mcantelon
Also politicians likely get kickbacks from the big players in gambling to the
little guys down.

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vnorby
The picture of the policemen holding a giant check is embarrassing. $470k
seized illegitimately from the citizens they are paid to protect...imagine
what that check is like for larger cities. What about policemen that play
online poker? How can counties be paid off when Full Tilt and other poker
entities are promising to pay out their players as well?

~~~
anonymoushn
The practice of stealing money from random people who aren't engaged in any
illegal activity is actually fairly common among law enforcement already. The
rationale given thus far is that "That money was for the purchase of illegal
drugs," or if that will not work, they will simply illegally sieze something
and refuse to ever schedule a meeting to let the citizen reclaim it, or
illegally sieze something and "lose" it. There's no recourse for citizens
because asset forfieture, busy schedules, and losing things are legal.

------
burgerbrain
The _only_ difference between the police and traditional organized crime is
scale.

~~~
firemanx
I'm sure the families of police officers who've died protecting others would
disagree with you.

I understand the dissatisfaction with the things that have happened to law
enforcement over the years, but it is a far, far cry from being the same thing
as organized crime. I'll disagree at great lengths with those who would abuse
the system with things like the article linked, no knock raids, abuse of due
process, and the myriad issues with the legal system, but honestly making that
kind of blanket normalization is poisonous to not only improving the state of
things, but the many, many, MANY good things our law enforcement organizations
DO do for the communities they serve.

~~~
burgerbrain
To put the risk assumed by being in law enforcement into some perspective,
here are some industries that saw _more_ incidences of fatal occupational
injuries due to "Assaults and violent acts":

Food Services.

Transportation and Warehousing.

Grocery Stores.

Retail.

...and more.

So next time you decide you must have some nice pepperoni pizza, tip your
local pizza delivery guy nicely and make sure to thank him for his service to
this country.

EDIT: citations are fun: <http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cftb0241.pdf>

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nkassis
I did not realize that the cases where closed and all. What happens if they
are found not guilty and try to get the money back? While the other 200K they
usually get is probably from small amounts not worth the fight. These are huge
sums that the defendants probably will fight for.

~~~
ojbyrne
If you read the article, it says it has nothing to do with the closure of the
large poker sites last month.

~~~
heyitsnick
To clarify a couple of points:

\- No 'large poker sites' were closed last month. PS, FT and Cereus network
pulled out of the US industry after the Black Friday indictments. All 4 sites
involved continue to operate today to non-US customers.

\- This asset sharing was due to the county police's involvement in to the
"Blue Monday" seizures that occurred ten days ago. It's a separate round of
bank seizures and domains, but to say it "has nothing to do" with the
proceding Black Friday is inaccurate.

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marshray
Read the comments. Every single one of them. Wow.

I have not seen the reputation of the US federal government so low since I was
a little kid seeing Viet Nam, Nixon, and Watergate play out on TV. But there's
not even a particularly hot war going at this point.

~~~
VladRussian
>But there's not even a particularly hot war going at this point.

war on drugs, war on terror, and a couple real wars - i.e. Afganistan and Iraq
- seems more than enough ways to "appropriate" money. Several "slow" long
"wars" are much more profitable than 1 short "hot" war.

~~~
uptown
> a couple real wars - i.e. Afganistan and Iraq

Don't forget Libya ... plus the handful of other countries over in that region
where our troops have always been stationed, or were recently deployed in
response to the instability.

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fbx
why is it illegal to gamble online and legal in physical world ?

~~~
smallblacksun
It is illegal to gamble in the physical world in most of the US (with some
very conspicuous exceptions - horse racing, Indian tribe-run casinos and
state-run lotteries).

~~~
ryanwanger
Also, in a lot of costal cities, you can get on a scheduled floating casino,
sail 7 miles out to sea, and start gambling.

~~~
enko
That is surprising to me. I bet you couldn't park a boat 7.1 miles out to sea
and sell heroin by the tonne!

