Caring large sums of cash in the USA can cause concern from police and other enforcement entities like TSA that the cash is for illegal activities. Police and federal enforcement can and will seize your cash and do so without charging you with an actual crime. You then have the burden of proving the cash as legitimate.
Edit: corrected cease to seize
Hello Massachusetts!
I saw the post from u/ak47workaccnt and was so happy that he took the initiative to ask his rep about civil forfeiture. He did what you are supposed to do with an important issue, talk to your state rep about it!
Unfortunately, the response he got was not great. While the comments responding to his post were great, they were all over the place. So I wanted to see if I could provide some background and support if other people were interested in the subject of civil forfeiture reform, and see if there is enough commitment to do something about it.
If you couldn't tell, I care about civil forfeiture. You could say it is my passion. I have been following reform efforts closely, especially in MA, which has the worst civil forfeiture laws in the country.
What is Civil Forfeiture?
First of all if you don't know what it is: civil forfeiture is a civil procedure taken by the government against physical property (mostly cash and cars.) It has been around longer than the United States and was originally used to seize and take legal ownership of ships caught smuggling and engaging in piracy; the ships owners were often across the Atlantic so charging the property was the only legal means for this process. This part makes some sense.
Now it has been perverted to be used as a tool in the war on drugs. They claim that civil forfeiture is going after property that is the proceeds or intended to be used in drug crimes and this is the only way to get it off the street. This doesn't make sense, as more often than not the property owner is the person police are seizing the property from.
Civil forfeiture is most often used in low dollar seizures. Because it is a civil process, there is no right to an attorney and hiring one usually takes more money than was seized.
In most states, there is also a giant profit incentive. The police get to keep the majority of the money they take, and then they can use it for military toys, training conferences, even margarita machines.
The right way to seize and take ownership of property is criminal
... keep reading on reddit ➡2018 6.47m 2019 5.35m 2020 15.43m 2021 19.17m
Edit: to include additional 2020 forfeitures from July.
This is your 14-minute Tuesday briefing in 3562 words.
##what will Armenia's universal healthcare look like?
To understand what types of "universal healthcare" systems there and their differences, I suggest reading this comment thread first. The government has been working on implementing one in Armenia.
Ex-Healthcare Minister QP MP Arsen Torosyan: this is more like a "social security" system based on principles of fairness, accessibility to masses, and affordability at the state level. We have to take both into account to have a sustainable system that helps citizens. //
Minister's adviser Shekherdimyan: coverage limits exist in every country. Even the richest ones don't include all medical services. The Canadian model is quite successful. Various European models have been quite good. I wouldn't include the United States in that list. // [BERNIE SANDERS WANTS TO KNOW YOUR LOCATION]
Arsen Torosyan: It's a single-payer system in which the funds will come from various sources. Petpatver currently uses contributions from various taxes. There will be new income/employer taxes, specifics of which are yet to be decided.
All the payments are collected in one place that will make strategic payments. The strategic purchaser must ensure reasonable and fair pricing, it must ensure competition among the quality service providers (hospitals, clinics), it must minimize the need for hospital care by monitoring chronic illnesses in clinics [preventative care].
The biggest risk is in regards to all parties thinking synchronously. The parties are Finance Ministry, Economy Min, Social Min, a bit of Central Bank, etc. //
Adviser Shekherdimyan: international experience shows that having a comprehensive insurance system is without a doubt a positive change. It opens our system to new possibilities that we currently lack. This mechanism will allow us to optimize expenses and give peace of mind to our population. //
CivilNet's street survey indicates most people support the idea as long as it provides decent coverage.
There are packages specific for certain types of health issues that cause death or disability. It includes treatments that are expensive and require long-term care. There is also a large package that covers medication.
The insurance won't cover unnecessary elective procedures, plasti
... keep reading on reddit ➡Hi all I was just reading how police can confiscate your cash and assets without any proof of a crime. Just a suspicion you may use it for a crime. With this in mind are any of you concerned your silver could be confiscated because of this? What do you do about it?
On 2nd December, officers confiscated $100,000 in cash without charging the owner (a 25 year old woman) of any crime or wrong doing. She had not committed any crime which was known to the officers and yet the money was taken from her. That is what stealing is- but if it is done by a centralized and regulated authority, it's confiscation to prevent wrong-doings.
In poorer areas in the US, cops makes cash seizures of as low as a few 100 dollars.
And this is precisely why we need cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. Nobody can just knock your doors and ask you to submit all your possessions to them in the name of prevention. You don't have to prove yourself to be innocent to get back your seized assets.
This graph illustrates the issue at hand. Ofcourse not all of these seizures were unwarranted but many/most of them were and that is exactly the crux of this whole issue.
https://preview.redd.it/t5dg236ynh481.png?width=1100&format=png&auto=webp&s=8ce82ae544c36bdd77931d8a8696a2b3d6bb84c5
The revenue related to civil asset forfeiture in Virginia has been valued at $34,690,466.00 by the nonprofit law firm Institute for Justice, according to the January 5, 2022 edition of Data is Plural published by Jeremy Singer-Vine (https://www.data-is-plural.com/archive/2022-01-05-edition/). The data span calendar years 2005 to 2018.
Some data:
- Of the 7,195 forfeitures, 179 were associated with criminal convictions
- Fairfax County Police Department was involved in 26 cases
- Alexandria Police Department was involved in three cases
- Accomack County Sheriff's Office was involved in one case
- Richmond Police Department was involved in 50 cases
The data set also includes the original charge, amended charge, and a ton of other information.
The original post on Data is Plural:
>Civil asset forfeiture. “Most states and the federal government have laws allowing police and prosecutors to seize and permanently keep Americans’ cash, cars, homes and other property suspected of being involved in a crime — without regard to the owners’ guilt or innocence,” the nonprofit law firm Institute for Justice writes in its third edition of Policing for Profit, published in 2020. The report gathers and analyzes datasets on property seized in dozens of states through this practice of civil asset forfeiture, and on the spending of forfeiture funds. It also examines seizures from the federal Consolidated Asset Tracking System, detailed public extracts of which the Department of Justice updates quarterly. As seen in: “Cops still take more stuff from people than burglars do” (The Why Axis, 2021), and “Stop and Seize” (Washington Post, 2014).
Given that police can seize anything with no evidence at all, you would think that when there is overwhelming evidence of a suspect using his plane, mansion, and estate to run a criminal international sex trafficking ring that that entire estate should be seized.
I want to buy a car with cash someday
Edit: USA
