Anthony On Privacy-Matters: The Feds are making a fortune stealing private property [feedly]

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The Feds are making a fortune stealing private property
// Personal Liberty Digest™

A new report out from the Institute for Justice reveals that the amount of money the federal government is raking in by seizing cash, cars and homes from Americans is rising dramatically.

In the second edition of its "Policing for Profit" report, the institute estimates that the Department of Justice seized $4.5 billion worth of Americans' personal property in 2014 through civil forfeiture.

Civil forfeiture allows the government to take cash, cars, homes and other property from people without ever convicting or even charging them with a crime. Often, victims of this government theft never see their belongings again.

Just 13 percent of the forfeitures that occurred between 1997 and 2013 were the result of direct knowledge that the property was used to commit a crime. The other 87 percent of forfeitures occurred under law enforcement's mere suspicion that the property was tied to a crime.

"Every year, police and prosecutors across the United States take hundreds of millions of dollars in cash, cars, homes and other property — regardless of the owners' guilt or innocence," the institute noted.

And it isn't just the police who are seizing property.

Consider this story from the report:

Lyndon McLellan runs a convenience store in Fairmont, N.C., and has done so without incident for more than a decade. All that changed in 2014, when the Internal Revenue Service used civil forfeiture to seize McLellan's entire $107,000 bank account. He did not stand accused of selling drugs or even of cheating on his taxes; in fact, he was not charged with any crime at all. Rather, the IRS claimed that he had been "structuring" his deposits — that is, breaking them into amounts of less than $10,000 to evade federal reporting requirements for large transactions. McLellan, like most people, did not even know what "structuring" was, let alone that it was illegal. His niece, who handles the deposits, had been advised by a bank teller that smaller deposits meant less paperwork for the bank, so she kept deposits small.

The government finally returned McLellan's funds after a legal battle and public outcry, but the small-business owner was still forced to foot hefty legal bills resulting from the incident.

There are hundreds of other stories like this from all over the country because the government has incentivized policing for profit at all levels of law enforcement and bureaucracy over the past couple decades.

In 1986, DOJ officials confiscated about $93.7 million worth of property through civil forfeiture laws. Last year, that number jumped to $4.5 billion, a 4,667 percent increase in just under 30 years.

Read the Institute for Justice's full report:

View this document on Scribd

More information about civil forfeiture from Personal Liberty^®:

"Police power is the foundation of the state""Maryland farmer fights to get back money the IRS stole through forfeiture""Christmas classic re-imagined: 'Twas the Night Raid Before Christmas""AG Holder moves against civil forfeitures""Another civil forfeiture horror story""House bill could curb IRS practice of seizing assets without probable cause""IRS seizes rural convenience store owner's career savings in another horrible abuse of civil forfeiture""Sorry, but the police can still steal your property""Small-business owner fights to reclaim money stolen by Feds""Who stole $2.5 billion from Americans? The answer might shock you""North Carolina store owner targeted in IRS civil forfeiture case is getting his money back""Lawmakers attempt dual check on federal power""A map that grades each state's asset forfeiture laws""Civil forfeiture shouldn't be this funny""In double win New Mexico civil forfeiture ban inhibits failed war on drugs""Rand Paul offers legislation to keep government from stealing innocent citizens' property""Minnesota ends law enforcement's civil forfeiture money grab""New Mexico puts an end to civil forfeiture"