ARRA News Service
News Blog for social, fiscal & national security conservatives who believe in God, family & the USA. Upholding the rights granted by God & guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, traditional family values, "republican" principles / ideals, transparent & limited "smaller" government, free markets, lower taxes, due process of law, liberty & individual freedom. Content approval rests with the ARRA News Service Editor. Opinions are those of the authors. While varied positions are reported, beliefs & principles remain fixed. No revenue is generated for or by this "Blog" - no paid ads - no payments for articles. Fair Use Doctrine is posted & used.
Blogger/Editor/Founder: Bill Smith, Ph.D. [aka: OzarkGuru & 2010 AFP National Blogger of the Year]
Contact: editor@arranewsservice.com (Pub. Since July, 2006)
    Home Page
   

One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors. -- Plato (429-347 BC)

Friday, March 24, 2017

This Law Puts Homeowners at Risk of Property Rights Violations

by Pat Nolan & David Safavian: The owner of the resort didn’t ask his guests why they were there. He offered plush accommodations to those seeking to get away.

Sometimes, guests would come to play golf at the private and very exclusive country club. Other times, they used the fabulous spa services down the road. Still others wanted to simply enjoy the nearby beach.

But people came and stayed at the resort, and it was profitable. Some would call it a huge success.

But not all of the guests were good people. A few brought their drug habits with them. And in 30 instances (over a period of 17 years in which the owner and his wife rented out rooms to guests 125,000 times), law enforcement got involved.

The local police knew that the owner wasn’t involved in drugs. He and his wife were model citizens who took pride in their establishment. They even cooperated with law enforcement when something suspicious was going on with their guests.

But the police also knew that the resort was valuable, and that its millions in worth could add to the police department’s budget under forfeiture law. But under state law, the local cops didn’t have enough evidence of crimes to institute state forfeiture proceedings.

Undeterred by limits imposed by the Massachusetts Legislature, the police utilized a workaround. Federal law provided a lower threshold for seizing assets. The local police could circumvent state rules on forfeiture by turning the case over to the feds.

Using a program called Equitable Sharing, if local law enforcement could convince the Justice Department to institute forfeiture proceedings, the locals would get a cut.

So the police went to the Drug Enforcement Administration and convinced it that the resort should be forfeited. The Drug Enforcement Administration then convinced the Justice Department, which authorized the seizure.

Served with a federal notice of civil forfeiture, the resort owner was told that he had to prove he was innocent in all this. If he failed to do so, Uncle Sam could take the property, auction it off, and keep the proceeds—most of which would end up in the coffers of the local police department.

The owner and his wife, who built the business, would end up with nothing, despite not having been charged with any crime, let alone convicted of anything.

This property is not Mar-a-Lago, and the owner is not Donald Trump. But this is a real case involving the Caswell Inn in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, in 2009.

The owner was baffled by the seizure of his hotel because he had always had a good relationship with the local police department. He asked a police official why they targeted him rather than a nearby motel that was notorious for prostitution and drug dealing. The officer explained that they had looked up the other motel’s assessed value and found that it was heavily mortgaged.

The police would have gotten very little money if they seized that one. But seizing the unmortgaged Caswell Inn would net them millions of dollars.

This process is a clear conflict of interest. The local police department profits from these seizures, even if there is no conviction of a crime. The more that is seized, the more money goes back to the police for things like new equipment and retirement programs.

Civil asset forfeiture has turned many law enforcement agencies into modern “Sheriffs of Nottingham,” robbing from the so-called rich to give to the poor local police departments. Outraged citizens have taken to calling this nefarious process “policing for profit.”

Unfortunately, it’s not out of the ordinary. According to The Washington Post, more assets were seized under civil forfeiture proceedings than were stolen in all of the burglaries that took place in the United States in 2014.

The owner of the Tewksbury hotel was very fortunate. The Institute for Justice learned of his case, and undertook the legal fight to get his hotel back. They won.

But it is worth noting that there is no way that the owner could have paid for such top-notch lawyers out his own pocket. Few others can afford to fight the government.

Prosecutors argue that forfeiture is an important weapon in the war on drugs. That may be true, but only if it is tied to a crime for which there is an actual conviction.

Without a conviction, the current system turns our legal rights upside down. When assets are seized, the owners are presumed guilty until proven innocent. They have the burden of showing that their ownership of the asset was not the result of criminal activity. Otherwise, the government gets to keep the money.

Proving the negative is very hard to do, particularly when the government has seized all your assets and you have no funds to hire a lawyer. That isn’t just unfair. It’s un-American.

The abuse of asset forfeiture has prompted a growing number of states to restrict its use to when someone has been convicted of a crime.

To get around these restrictions, the federal government uses an equitable sharing law, which allows federal agencies to seize and launder proceeds, and then cut the local police in on the back end. It’s a pretty nifty way for the Justice Department and local police to conspire and get around limits imposed by state legislatures.

This issue arose just last month when Trump met with local law enforcement officials. During the meeting, a Texas sheriff complained that proposed reforms to civil asset forfeiture in the Lone Star State would hurt his ability to fight drug traffickers.

Without anyone to explain to him the unfairness of civil asset forfeiture, the president seemed to side with the sheriff and against state efforts to reform it.

Trump won his election by fighting for the “little guy” against an overbearing and dishonest government. Civil asset forfeiture is a prime example of just how overbearing and dishonest the government can be.

The next time asset forfeiture comes up, the president should remember the case of the hotel in Tewksbury. Under current law, his prized resorts are just one Hollywood star with a coke habit away from being seized.
-----------------
Pat Nolan is the director of the American Conservative Union Foundation’s Center for Criminal Justice Reform. David Safavian is deputy director of the American Conservative Union Foundation's Center for Criminal Justice Reform. Both are contributors to The Daily Signal.

Tags: property confiscation, law, puts homeowners, at risk, property rights violations, Pat Nolan, David Safavian, The Daily Signal To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!
Posted by Bill Smith at 11:00 AM - Post Link

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home


View U.S. National Debt

Don't miss anything!
Subscribe to the
ARRA News Service
It's FREE & No Ads!

You will receive a verification email
& must validate you subscribed!

You Then Receive One Email Each AM
With Prior Days Articles / Toons / More


Also, Join & leave conservative posts & comments on
Facebook.com/ARRANewsService


Recent Posts:
Personal Tweets by the editor:
Dr. Bill - OzarkGuru - @arra
#Christian Conservative; Retired USAF & Grad Professor. Constitution NRA ProLife schoolchoice fairtax - Editor ARRA NEWS SERVICE. THANKS FOR FOLLOWING!

Action Links!
State Upper & Lower House Members
State Attorney Generals
State Governors
The White House
US House of Representatives
US Senators
GrassFire
NumbersUSA
Ballotpedia

Facebook Accts - Dr. Bill Smith
Pages:
ARRA News Service
Arkansans Against Big Government
Alley-White Am. Legion #52
Catholics & Protestants United Against Discrimination
End Taxpayer Funding of NPR
Overturn Roe V. Wade
Prolife Soldiers
Project Wildfire 4 Life
Republican Liberty Caucus of Arkansas
The Gold Standard
US Atty Gen Loretta Lynch, aka Eric Holder, Must Go
Veterans for Sarah Palin
Why Vote for Hillary (Satire)
FB Groups:
Arkansas For Sarah Palin
Arkansas Conservative Caucus
Arkansas County Tea Party
Arkansans' Discussion Group on National Issues
Blogs for Borders
Conservative Solutions
Conservative Voices
Defend Marriage -- Arkansas
FairTax
FairTax Nation
Arkansas for FairTax
Friends of the TEA Party in Arkansas
Freedom Roundtable
Pro-Life Rocks - Arkansas
Republican Network
Republican Liberty Caucus of AR
Reject the U.N.

Patriots
Exchange
Links

Request Via
Article Comment

Links to ARRA News
A Patriotic Nurse
Agora Associates
a12iggymom's Blog
America, You Asked For It!
America's Best Choice
ARRA News Twitter
As The Crackerhead Crumbles
Blogs For Borders
Blogs for Palin
Blow the Trumpet Ministry
Boot Berryism
Cap'n Bob & the Damsel
Chicago Ray Report - Obama Regime Report
Chuck Baldwin - links
Common Cents
Conservative Voices
Diana's Corner
Greater Fitchburg For Life
Lasting Liberty Blog
Liberal Isn't Amy
Marathon Pundit
Patriot's Corner
Right on Issues that Matter
Right Reason
Rocking on the Right Side
Saber Point
Saline Watchdog
Sultan Knish
The Blue Eye View
The Born Again Americans
TEA Party Cartoons
The Foxhole | Unapologetic Patriot
The Liberty Republican
The O Word
The Path to Tyranny Blog
The Real Polichick
The War on Guns
TOTUS
Twitter @ARRA
Underground Notes
Warning Signs
Women's Prayer & Action
WyBlog

Editor's Managed Twitter Accounts
Twitter Dr. Bill Smith @arra
Twitter Arkansas @GOPNetwork
Twitter @BootBerryism
Twitter @SovereignAllies
Twitter @FairTaxNation

Editor's Recommended Orgs
Accuracy in Media (AIM)
American Action Forum (AAF)
American Committment
American Culture & Faith Institute
American Enterprise Institute
American Family Business Institute
Americans for Limited Government
Americans for Prosperity
Americans for Tax Reform
American Security Council Fdn
AR Faith & Ethics Council
Arkansas Policy Foundation
Ayn Rand Institute
Bill of Rights Institute
Campaign for Working Families
CATO Institute
Center for Individual Freedom
Center for Immigration Studies
Center for Just Society
Center for Freedom & Prosperity
Citizens Against Gov't Waste
Citizens in Charge Foundstion
Coalition for the Future American Worker
Competitive Enterprise Institute
Concerned Veterans for America
Concerned Women for America
Declaration of Am. Renewal
Eagle Forum
FairTax
Family Research Council
Family Security Matters
Franklin Center for Gov't & Public Integrity
Freedom Works
Gingrich Productions
Global Incident Map
Great Americans
Gold Standard 2012 Project
Gun Owners of America (GOA)
Heritage Action for America
David Horowitz Freedom Center
Institute For Justice
Institute for Truth in Accounting
Intercollegiate Studies Institute
Judicial Watch
Less Government
Media Reseach Center
National Center for Policy Analysis
National Right To Work Foundation
National Rifle Association (NRA)
National Rifle Association (NRA-ILA)
News Busters
O'Bluejacket's Patriotic Flicks
OathKeepers
Open Secrets
Presidential Prayer Team
Religious Freedom Coalition
Renew America
Ron Paul Institute
State Policy Network
Tax Foundation
Tax Policy Center
The Club for Growth
The Federalist
The Gold Standard Now
The Heritage Foundation
The Leadership Institute
Truth in Accounting
Union Facts



Blogs For Borders

Reject the United Nations

Presidential Prayer Team

Thousands of Deadly Islamic Terror Attacks Since 9/11


FairTax Nation on FaceBook
Friends of Israel - Stand with Israel
Blog Feeds
Syndicated - Get the ARRA News Service feed Syndicated!
ARRA Blog Feed

Add to Google Reader or Homepage

Add to The Free Dictionary

Powered by Blogger


  • To Exchange Links - Email: editor@arranewsservice.com!
  • Comments by contributing authors or other sources do not necessarily reflect the position the editor, other contributing authors, sources, readers, or commenters. No contributors, or editors are paid for articles, images, cartoons, etc. While having reported on and promoting principles & beleifs beliefs of other organizations, this blog/site is soley controlled and supported by the editor. This site/blog does not advertise for money or services nor does it solicit funding for its support.
  • Fair Use: This site/blog may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available to advance understanding of political, human rights, economic, democracy, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as provided for in section Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. Per said section, the material on this site/blog is distributed without profit to readers to view for the expressed purpose of viewing the included information for research, educational, or satirical purposes. Any person/entity seeking to use copyrighted material shared on this site/blog for purposes that go beyond "fair use," must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
  • © 2006 - 2020 ARRA News Service
Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.