Little-Acorn
Gold Member
What was the charge? Never mentioned in the video.
The guy taking the video said the cops could find other people drinking in public on the campus, if they bothered to look. Was this hot-dog vendor drinking in public? Was he dealing drugs? What's the charge?
The U.S. Constitution says that the cops can't search OR SIEZE anything from a citizen unless they have a warrant. If that makes it more difficult for cops to apprehend or charge a person legitimately suspected of committing a crime, too bad. That part of the Constitution was written very carefully, and for very good reason, and in 200 years the American people have seen fit to not change it even a little.
If cops don't like it, or even if Congressmen don't like it, that doesn't mean they can violate it. By cops taking his money (that's property too), or by congressmen enacting a Federal law saying "asset forfeiture" is OK. Both acts are flatly illegal, even if the cops have a legitimate reason (aka "probable cause") to think the guy committed a crime, whether drinking in public, or dealing drugs, or whatever.
Maybe for all I know, the vendor is a slimebag drug dealer, and this cop caught him in the act. I don't know, I didn't see that in the video. But even if the cop did catch him in the act, it's flagrantly unconstitutional for the cop to confiscate his money. Money isn't illegal. And without a warrant, the cops can't even take the guy's hat off his head.
BTW, the cops' job is NOT to arrest bad guys. It's to enforce the law. And that includes the 4th amendment. And if the cops violate the 4th (as it looks to me this cop did), they aren't doing their job. In fact, they are committing a crime themselves.