
Law enforcement took more stuff from people than burglars did last year (2015) - ryan_j_naughton
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/23/cops-took-more-stuff-from-people-than-burglars-did-last-year
======
lettergram
Illinois just put the burden of proof on the prosecution (as opposed to the
item(s) to prove their innocence)

[http://ij.org/press-release/illinois-overwhelmingly-
approves...](http://ij.org/press-release/illinois-overwhelmingly-approves-
bill-protect-innocent-civil-forfeiture/)

~~~
kevin_b_er
A step in the right direction, but it doesn't seem to have closed the federal
loophole. Local police still seize your property and give it to the feds.
Feds, on paper, have seized/stolen your property now. Feds give a nice
kickback to local dept.

~~~
Retric
Yet another reminder that the US is sinking into a corrupt 3rd world country
without a middle class or the rule of law.

------
honestoHeminway
The Firefighters

The Firefighters' Guild has been formed and dissolved repeatedly throughout
the history of Ankh-Morpork. Usually formed in response to fires which cause
significant damage to large parts of the city, the guild is usually dissolved
in response to... er, fires which cause significant damage to large parts of
the city. The Guild suffers from the undying capitalist spirit of Ankh-
Morpork, as those men who are paid per-fire extinguished eventually begin to
guarantee a regular supply of fires to be put out. This has led to the
frequent destruction of large portions of the city and ultimately to the
Guild's being banned.

~~~
nosuchthing

      Eventually, the colonists realized that, even with this 
      small army of paid rat killers, they were failing to make 
      a dent in the rat population.
    
      They proceeded to Plan B, offering any enterprising 
      civilian the opportunity to get in on the hunt. A bounty 
      was set—one cent per rat—and all you had to do to claim it 
      was submit a rat’s tail to the municipal offices. That 
      way, the government wouldn’t be overrun with bulky rat 
      corpses. “I always think about that,” Dr. Vann says. “Who 
      is the poor guy counting all these rat tails?”
    
      The Vietnamese, too, were pleased with the arrangement, 
      but not for the same reason. In the beginning, rat-tails 
      poured in as locals slaughtered them by the dozen. Their 
      entrepreneurial spirit took over though, and soon enough, 
      French health officials began to notice a strange 
      phenomenon: tailless rats proliferating in the outskirts 
      of the capital.
    
      Upon further investigation, it became apparent that the 
      Vietnamese were breeding rats specifically to receive cash  
      for their tails. Reports also suggest some people smuggled 
      out-of-town rats into Hanoi.
    
    
      By 1906, there was an outbreak of plague as a result of  
      the infected rat population. At least 263 people died, 
      most of whom were Vietnamese.
    

[http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hanoi-rat-
massacre-1902](http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hanoi-rat-massacre-1902)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect)

~~~
honestoHeminway
The easy solution is to scream "the goverment is to blame" \- while the truth
is "complex reality is to blame". These very same perverse incentives are
raging in every company. The scale of goverment alone, with whom we all
interact, and a lack of good PR-Work, makes them more visible.

So how reduce this? Slowing down processes was the answer, basically, replace
the lack of human thought and planning, with a meta-machine which was able to
plan, think, react and control.

Is there software to model this? To treat every part of a organisations
process also as agents, and thus prevent free-loading and incentive
perversion?

Better even, a software that remodels a process, once free-loading appears?

Also, in a world, where freeloading is soon to be the majoritys occupation,
due to robots and NN taking over work, is it still meaning-full to apply this
software? Are companys in such a world not just daycare-centers for otherwise
unemployed grown-ups, and paid for that by society?

------
dmux
CT has banned civil forfeiture without a criminal conviction. A step in the
right direction.

~~~
Symmetry
Good for them. But my understanding is that local cops can still seize an
asset, declare that it was really a Federal seizure, have the money assigned
to federal government, then the federal government gives most of it back as a
bounty. The whole program seems to be a way for the Feds to encourage local
police to follow federal priorities rather than local priorities and sadly I'm
sure the current attorney general will be looking for ways to do more of that.

~~~
syshum
Yep, and in CT is seems 93% of revenue cam from the Federal Sharing program

[http://ij.org/pfp-state-pages/pfp-Connecticut/](http://ij.org/pfp-state-
pages/pfp-Connecticut/)

~~~
camiller
That article only shows data through 2013, a number of states have changed
their laws in the last four years.

------
cmurf
We have an AG who wants to take even more stuff from people. Highway men.
That's what this country needs.

“We hope to issue this week a new directive on asset forfeiture — especially
for drug traffickers,” Sessions

~~~
justadeveloper2
I don't know why someone downvoted you for this because it was news just the
other day that Sessions said this. While I think Sessions is perhaps competent
as AG, I don't know why he has such zeal for asset forfeiture. Why can't we
have people in these positions who are consistent? We ostensibly have an
Administration that wants to support the Constitution and rule of law, and
then they go supporting policies and laws that are completely out of line with
our Bill of Rights. I don't get it except statism is a brain disorder.

I still say the Obama Administration was even worse--Lynch used her office as
a political weapon. Holder should have been prosecuted for Fast & Furious.

It's a mess. I am no criminal, but I avoid cops at all costs just so I don't
'accidentally' get shot.

Also, we need to stop allowing police to have qualified immunity. Their role
in US society has been elevated above regular citizens even though they are
regular citizens. Their training is "shoot until slide lock" and to always
meet force with equivalent and higher force. I live near Minneapolis and I can
tell you that after Castile, I thought things would get better, but no, cops
are shooting dogs, people, everything! The Burnsville police killed a guy who
was whacked out on drugs--the guy had a knife, but he wasn't hurting anyone
and when he tried to run away after a botched attempt at getting him out of
his car, they shot him in the back for 'reasons.' Their egregious and
troubling behavior was later deemed as 'following procedure.'

I think we can see that not reigning in this bad behavior is going to lead to
us having to deal with death squads who act under the color of law, such as
they have in the Philippines and Nicaragua, and basically every third world
country.

~~~
pmorici
Sessions probably supports it because he is going out of his way to be "pro
police" and police departments love civil asset forfeiture because the assets
that get seized go directly toward their department budgets.

It is a major conflict of interest for the police.

~~~
syshum
It goes right to their budgets and they do not have to worry about little
things like due process or constitutional rights.

------
dovdovdov
also catching up with the murder rate...

~~~
throwawaymanbot
are you implying that there is a correlation between civil forfeiture and
Murder rate?

------
lr4444lr
I detest civil forfeiture, but this is clickbait. The burglary figure is only
_reported_ theft. Also, the actual metric is _value_ of goods, not number of
takings. Obviously, assets in forfeiture are going to be bigger on average
several times over than what a thief typically gets when rummaging a house in
a 2 minute panic to get out before the authorities are signaled.

EDIT: Also, if you read the article, it buries even one of the few redeeming
aspects of civil forfeiture, payments to victims. If you buy a car and the
police seize it because the VIN is tracked to a vehicle previously owned by a
drug dealer who used it to ply his contraband but then sold it to pay his way
as a fugitive, and once apprehended the car is then auctioned off and money is
paid to the family of a victim he earlier had killed, that's part of a much
bigger legal process. The remedy for the unfortunate person who bought the
vehicle unawares in good faith is to go to his dealer and demand a refund or
take him to court for misrepresenting the car, or if the paperwork looks good
on the part of the dealer, he'll have to rely on his loss insurance.

~~~
syshum
Your Hypothetical situation of victim payment NEVER happens

Most Cars seized by the government are because they found some small amount of
drugs are paraphernalia in the car and seized it

I can not think of a single instances of what you claim playing out IRL, so I
would love to see where your source is that shows cars seized by the
government are legally bought off of former drug dealers then seized by the
government from the new owners. Even under Asset Forfeiture I do not believe
that would be legal.

they are also seizing houses from parents because their child has small amount
of pot...

This defense of Civil Asset Forfeiture you have concocted in your mind is weak
and not at all inline with reality

~~~
mijoharas
In general I agree with your statement. However, the article clearly states:

> A big chunk of that 2014 deposit, for instance, was the $1.7 billion Bernie
> Madoff judgment, most of which flowed back to the victims.

~~~
syshum
I was referring to the hypothetical of a innocent person buying a car from a
drug dealer unknowingly, then at some point in the future the police trace the
VIN and seize the car because it had been owned by the drug dealer in the
past, then selling that car and giving the money to the victims of said drug
dealer that also apparently killed someone.

That is the situation the comment I was replying to that was concocted to
support Civil Asset Forfeiture

Further the article is talking about all Federal Seizures not just Civil Asset
Forfeiture, the comments I was replying to isolated that to Civil Asset
Forfeiture

JPMorgan Chase money on behalf of the Madoff criminal prosecution was not a
Civil Asset forfeiture

Edit:

To add, I have no problem with, and most organizations have no problem with
CRIMINAL asset forfeiture, which is where the government charges a person with
a crime, convicts them then seizes assets that person owns to pay restitution
to victims of crimes.

Civil Asset Forfeiture is not that, and where most people object calling it
basically theft. The government do not charge anyone with a crime, you are not
afforded any due process or rights, and you must prove your property innocent
in order to get it back

Civil Asset Forfeiture is an end run around the constitution, and basic human
rights. it needs to be abolished

------
tbcj
State and local governments are, at least, partially to blame for the increase
as a consequence of decreased budgets given to law enforcement, including
district attorneys' offices. That money is often used to make up budget
shortfalls, and often nearly doesn't provide enough to competently and fully
staff such offices.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
>decreased budgets given to law enforcement

They could make do with what they have if they made an honest effort to make
do with it.

The cost of a body on the job depends a lot on how you field that body. Equip
the officer with the latest and greatest tech the cost of each officer-hour
goes up significantly. Don't hire enough people and make people work overtime
and the cost of an average officer-hour skyrockets

Look at how small town 4-person departments in low crime areas operate. They
can't simply ask for money because the town knows they don't need it.

