The
seminars offered police officers some useful tips on seizing property
from suspected criminals. Don’t bother with jewelry (too hard to dispose
of) and computers (“everybody’s got one already”), the experts
counseled. Do go after flat screen TVs, cash and cars. Especially nice
cars.
In
one seminar, captured on video in September, Harry S. Connelly Jr., the
city attorney of Las Cruces, N.M., called them “little goodies.” And
then Mr. Connelly described how officers in his jurisdiction could not
wait to seize one man’s “exotic vehicle” outside a local bar.
“A
guy drives up in a 2008 Mercedes, brand new,” he explained. “Just so
beautiful, I mean, the cops were undercover and they were just like
‘Ahhhh.’ And he gets out and he’s just reeking of alcohol. And it’s
like, ‘Oh, my goodness, we can hardly wait.’ ”
Mr. Connelly was talking about a practice known as civil asset forfeiture,
which allows the government, without ever securing a conviction or even
filing a criminal charge, to seize property suspected of having ties to
crime. The practice, expanded during the war on drugs in the 1980s, has
become a staple of law enforcement agencies because it helps finance
their work. It is difficult to tell how much has been seized by state
and local law enforcement, but under a Justice Department program, the
value of assets seized has ballooned to $4.3 billion in the 2012 fiscal
year from $407 million in 2001. Much of that money is shared with local
police forces.
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