"Law" Lets I.R.S. Seize Accounts on Suspicion, No Crime Required

[Contumacious]

. Additionally, you're portraying every civil forfeiture as an act of theft against unwitting and innocent people charged with nothing. In many instances Civil Forfeiture is used against organized crime and used only after grand jury indictments have been issued.

Bulshit.

The reason there is "organized crime" is because the government has forced a product or service into the black market.


.

Another problem with the 'what liberals demand' argument is that Kaley V. United Staes, the USSC case that defines civil forfeiture rules at the grand indictment level got the vote of every conservative justice but Roberts. When you have both Scalia and Thomas on the side you're condemning, you can hardly call it a 'liberal' vision. Though it was a 6-3 verdict that surprisingly brought in Kagan. Only Sotomayor, Ginsburg and Roberts dissented. An odd grouping on both sides, with Kagen joining the conservative wing and Roberts the liberal.

I don't know why that amazes you. In order to be nominated a SCOTUS Justice the putative candidate must show solid government supremacist credentials.

 

[OnePercenter]

This is a great DEMOPUBLICAN PArty disaster.

How can people being caught laundering business monies in personal accounts be 'a great DEMOPUBLICAN PArty disaster?'

 

[FA_Q2]

No, it isn't. It can be a difficult process, but its far from impossible or even improbable. Additionally, you're portraying every civil forfeiture as an act of theft against unwitting and innocent people charged with nothing. In many instances Civil Forfeiture is used against organized crime and used only after grand jury indictments have been issued. The problem with the practice isn't the seizures. Its the low threhold of proof necessary for the seizure. Raise the standard of evidence and the issue resolves itself.

Sure - no one is arguing that the government should not be able to seize assets that are involved in crimes. The establishment of a crime must be the absolute least metric necessary to do such though and we know that is simply not the case.

The idea, though, that it is just 'difficult' is simply wrong as many people caught on the other side have testified to. It is far more than difficult - it is nigh impossible. Of course that is because of the low standards and the asinine idea that property can be held for a crime even though it is literally impossible for property to commit a crime.

The Supreme Court currently uses grand jury indictment as its standard for civil forfeiture. But is far, far higher standard than the 'Tengo mucho mucho dinero in su trucky trailer' standard used by the highway patrol in some rural areas. And requires actual evidence of an actual crime to be presented in an actual court to an actual grand jury before it can be implemented. That's still way to low for forfeiture which is a genuine transfer of ownership. But I'd argue is more than adequate for asset freezes. And in every contested case, that's effectively what it is.

I personally have no problem with civil forfeiture of assets used in criminal activity from a felon convicted of that crime. 'Used in criminal activity' and 'convicted of that crime' being the operative phrases. Asset freezes would be a valid middle ground, but only after indictment.

And I don't think you would get an argument on that. The overall point though is that is NOT the case. Nowhere have I stated that civil forfeiture is something that cannot be lawful or proper period. There is, of course, a place for such a concept right where you are putting it - AFTER a crime has been established.

Again, that is not the case here. The reality is that the mere suspension is required - the suspicion that the PD needs some new funding for a 'toy.'

The obvious problem with that reasoning is that Civil forfeitures occur most often on the State level, both in events and total funds taken. And very frequently in conservative States, with vast support from conservative justices. This has very little to do with a liberal or conservative doctrine, as its opposed by both. The abuse in question is inherent in the low threshold of evidence needed to seize the property. Which is why by simply raising that threshold the entire issue is solved.

That is a problem with YOUR logic - namely the logic that you keep jumping on to define my argument with a whole host of things that I have never said. I have never made the case, for example, that states are not just as guilty. They are, in fact, usually worse. This is, IMHO, directly due to the complete loss of any semblance of federalism in this nation. What we have now is basically a federal government with another 50 little bureaucracies running around adding more weight and regulation to federal ones. I have also NEVER stated that liberals agreed with this travesty. You argue against that point for several paragraphs yet that was never my point.

What I did state was that it is an inevitable consequence of an ever increasing and more encroaching government. THAT is where liberals come in. Not that they would support this type of thing but that it is born directly from such concepts. Liberals, IMHO, tend to have this nice vision of compassionate government that cares for the people and fights corruption. I find that idea rather naive. Government looks out for itself. There is nothing wrong with that of course. There is only a problem when you allow government to become so powerful that it no longer needs real support from the people anymore.

Furthering this idea, pointing out the republican controlled districts does not really mean anything to me. Republicans have not supported freedom for decades. Gay marriage is such small government position. Mandates on vaginal probes for abortions is very small government. Bombing the crap out of every nation that is not on board with whatever the plan of the day is certainly espouses a small government philosophy.
Don't make me laugh.

Here's a site dedicated civil forfietures. (tab for different states is in the upper right hand corner)

Asset Forfeiture Report Florida The Institute for Justice

You'll find that the States with republican legislatures typically have the least protections for property owners in civil forfeiture law. While democratically held legislatures typically have the most protections for property owners in civil forfeiture law. While implementation of the law follows no particular pattern of liberal or conservative. California for example gets a grade of C in its laws. But an F in implementation for a final grade of D. Arizona has a D in the law and a D in implementation for a final grade of D. One liberal, one conservative, same grade.

I'd argue that the laws better represent what a 'liberal' or 'conservative' would want however. And liberal states average roughly a C. While Conservative States are D to F on average.

And I would argue that the states represent what a DEMOCRAT and REPUBLICAN would want - not a liberal or conservative.

Unless you really think that Bush was anything even close to a conservative and Obama a liberal....

They are not even close. They are closer to the same political spectrum than the actual people they were 'representing.' I would call them both corporatist.

Another problem with the 'what liberals demand' argument is that Kaley V. United Staes, the USSC case that defines civil forfeiture rules at the grand indictment level got the vote of every conservative justice but Roberts. When you have both Scalia and Thomas on the side you're condemning, you can hardly call it a 'liberal' vision. Though it was a 6-3 verdict that surprisingly brought in Kagan. Only Sotomayor, Ginsburg and Roberts dissented. An odd grouping on both sides, with Kagen joining the conservative wing and Roberts the liberal.

And that is supposed to make this a conservative measure?

That does not lead any credence to that idea at all. So the judges split. And they didnt even split on ideological lines. Kagan isn't even one of the centrists.

You do realize that I NEVER stated this was something that liberals supported though, right????

And that's where I think you're wrong. The farther you go back in our history, the more egregious the violates of rights are at the state level. Execution for sodomy, Jim Crow laws, mandatory religious participation, felony criminalization of interracial sex or marriage, seizure of property without compensation (or any criminal complaint), mandatory castration of the mentally ill, no suffrage for women or non-property owners. For crying out loud, the Bill of Rights didn't even apply to the States until nearly the beginning of the 20th century. Texas didn't stop criminalizing consensual sexual behavior in adults until 2004.

And then there's Slavery. One of the most brutal, tyrannical, draconian, insane practices in the history of our nation or any other. And it was the beating heart of the economy of most southern states for 3 full generations after the signing of the declaration of independence. Institutionalized and violently protected by the States for just as long.

If tyranny is insanity, then the early nation was batshit crazy. The idyllic, freedom loving utopia that many conservatives imagine the past to be is a cotton candy fantasy based on profound, willful ignorance, or straight up Dinesh D'Soaza historical revisionism. With today being a mere twitches of bipolar disorder in comparison.

Your 'decent into tyranny' fails on three fronts. First, a descent from what? The past was less free than the present. Not by little nibbles here and there. But by enormous blood soaked, ball chopping, race enslaving, gender disenfranchising leaps and bounds. Second, If tyranny is justification for the dissolution of the entire government, and the past was more tyrannical by an absolutely *absurd* degree, then by your own logic, our nation should have been dissolved the moment it was created. And I would disagree with such an assessment for the third problem with your argument:

This nation is a work in progress on a generally upward trajectory in terms of rights. The founder's America deserved to survive as a government because it was the best they could do with the situation they had. And they were aiming higher than they were able. That upward trajectory resulted in more freedoms, a greater appreciation for actual liberty and the liberalization of laws over time that were undeniably tyrannical and insane. The longer our nation existed, the more liberty abounded. Oh, there were twitches backward, to be sure. Dred Scott, Anti-Chinese laws, Jim Crow, Japanese Internment, Segregatoin, the Patriot Act, and the like. But the overall trajectory has been toward more liberty and more freedom.

Until today, we have more practice choice, more freedom and more liberty than at any point in our nation's history. And NOW.....NOW is when you argue that our government has lost its right to exist? Not when the USSC upheld State seizures of properties without compensation in Barron V. Baltimore. Not when the Mormon Extermination Act was codified into law. Not when Wallace stood in the school house doors trying to keep blacks out of white colleges. Not when Slavery was a violently defended institution. Not when an entire gender wasn't allowed to vote.

But now when none of those things are happening. What the fuckity fuck, dude?

More arguments that I have not made. Mind pointing out where I state the past was some awesome place filled with sugar plumbs and freedom. Perhaps you can point out where I stated the 'government has lost its right to exist.'

You are damn right that the nation was bat shit crazy before - the entire world was. You understand that the problem is not where we are AT but where we are going. Look at it this way, in our nations past we have fought and moved forward with increasing our freedoms. That has always been one of the greatest things about USA. We ended slavery, fought racism and worked to on equality. I see very little of that now. Certainly there are a few examples - gays are finally allowed to marry in much of the nation and I would bet that will be an issue of the past in less than a decade. Yay, we corrected a failure of this nation for 5% of the population. Meanwhile, the government has essentially declared no one, anywhere has any right to privacy.

Still don't see the problem? You mention the PA like it was some little hiccup. That is absurd. It is a HUGE step in the wrong direction. the basic right of privacy - something that has been a given in the recent past has essentially been declared to no longer exist. The real tragedy here is not even that it passed. What should get you really interested in what is going on is that the democrats, who were quite vocally against it when Bush signed the law, passed it with an overwhelming majority. It seems that virtually no one in the government sees the problem with this.

The examples in the OP? The video that I supplied. Do you not see that we have CHANGED DIRECTION. Rather than move in a direction of freedom we are moving in a direction of governmental control and surveillance. The war on terrorism is being used as the greatest patsy ever as a reason to bomb whatever nation we see fit, monitor whoever we want and take whatever we feel the need to. Go take a look at the tax law sometime - there isn't a single person on earth who understands it. Why do you think that is?

You ask why NOW? For a few reasons. For one, I wasn't around in the 1920's so there really is no point in wondering why I chose this decade - its the one where I am here and able. For another, the reality is that we are NOT an enslaved nation. We are free right now. That does not mean that we are going to always remain free, far from it. When the public no longer cares, when they no longer feel it is necessary to guard our rights from the government and when people no longer pay attention to what the government is doing we are destined to lose that freedom. That is what I feel is going on RIGHT NOW. We might be free today but what about in 20 years? Will my children look forward and say they live in the best place on the planet to live? Will they be as free as I am today?

I don't think so because we are losing our freedom in an effort to feel safe and not have to worry about actually making decisions. From the type of butter that I can buy to the lemonade stand on the street corner - the government is ensuring that they get involved for my own good. From my personal phone conversations to my purchasing habits at Ace Hardware, the government needs to monitor me for 'our safety.' I need a scan to get on a plane even though it takes the passengers to catch anyone actually planning to blow anything up. Good thing they have caught all those pocket knives and lotion though - wouldn't want any of that on the plane.

You keep beating on the idea that we are free now. Well, that car was real safe until it actually drove off the cliff. The trick is to catch it BEFORE it goes off the cliff. The trick is to influence the government BEFORE you lose that freedom as it takes freedom to do so.

 

[Skylar]

TWhat we have now is basically a federal government with another 50 little bureaucracies running around adding more weight and regulation to federal ones. I have also NEVER stated that liberals agreed with this travesty. You argue against that point for several paragraphs yet that was never my point.What we have now is basically a federal government with another 50 little bureaucracies running around adding more weight and regulation to federal ones. I have also NEVER stated that liberals agreed with this travesty. You argue against that point for several paragraphs yet that was never my point.

How does federalism have anything to do with this? There's absolutely nothing in our current system that requires a single state use utilize civil forfeiture law. Nothing. They are *allowed* to. And 50 of 50 times, they *choose* to. How is 50 of 50 states choosing to do something individually a 'failure of federalism'. Its a demonstration of it. What federalist mechanism would have prevented it this choice before the 'complete collapse of federalism'? Nothing.

Federalism is a non-factor in non-mandatory law. Before your 'collapse' or after, the States would have the exact same authority to choose. Nor is there any force 'compelling' them to embrace non-mandatory laws like this after your 'collapse'. The entire argument is DOA out of the gate.

Sure - no one is arguing that the government should not be able to seize assets that are involved in crimes. The establishment of a crime must be the absolute least metric necessary to do such though and we know that is simply not the case.

In the instances where indictments have been issued, there is a threshold of due process of law. I think that threshold is too low and needs to be raised. But there is a process involving a judge, a grand jury, a reviewed standard of evidence, prosecution and an opportunity for defense. This I wouldn't consider meeting any credible definition of 'tyrannical'.

The seizure of money based on the mere suspicion like those seizures done when an officer 'feels a crime has been committed' is bullshit. As if there's enough evidence to seize property, there's enough to arrest someone. And in some civil forfeiture cases the money is taken and the arrest is never made. That's where we are approaching a tyrannical threshold in my opinion. If the USSC were to sign off on such a standard, we'd clearly have to take steps to correct it. An amendment perhaps. The situation would be that egregious. But the SCOTUS never has, and the issue is working its way through the law.

What I did state was that it is an inevitable consequence of an ever increasing and more encroaching government. THAT is where liberals come in. Not that they would support this type of thing but that it is born directly from such concepts. Liberals, IMHO, tend to have this nice vision of compassionate government that cares for the people and fights corruption. I find that idea rather naive. Government looks out for itself. There is nothing wrong with that of course. There is only a problem when you allow government to become so powerful that it no longer needs real support from the people anymore.

Wow....that's like an epic and total abdication of any personal responsibility on the part of the States and conservatism. Your argument breaks in so many ways. First, your 'federalism' argument is crap. There's nothing forcing any state to do this. Its a choice. Its not even like speed limits where the government is withholding funding if the States don't succumb to federal mandates. There is no negative consequence whatsoever if a State refuses to create its own civil forfeiture laws.

Each state is individually responsible for its choice in this matter. With their civil forfeiture laws a reflection of the will of their individual legislatures. And thus the responsibility of their individual legislatures alone (well, the governor obviously has to sign off). Every single conservative state legislature that voted in their civil forfeiture laws are singularly responsible for every portion of them. If conservativism is such a leaf on the water that the mere OPTION of civil forfeiture laws robs it of any control or responsibility over its own actions, then as a political philosophy its so anemic as to be utterly impotent and void of any principle or utility as a governing ideal.

And I don't credit conservatism with such an impotent, powerless position. Not only did the conservative States embrace civil forfeiture law. They, on average, have civil forfeiture laws that are more severe than that of liberal states or the federal government. Utterly obliterating even the idea that civil forfeiture laws are the product of liberalism. As in every single instance of their passage by conservative legislatures, they have been the direct and singular product of conservatism. Only with the laws being just a little more egregious, with the protection to personal liberty just a little more stripped away on average.

And I would argue that the states represent what a DEMOCRAT and REPUBLICAN would want - not a liberal or conservative.

So Arizona and Texas aren't conservative? California and New York aren't liberal? Really?

Then why don't you give us your personal definitions and we'll see how useful those are.

And that is supposed to make this a conservative measure?

Its yet another example....along with each and every conservative State legislature who carefully crafted and voted in their own civil forfeiture laws that there is nothing in these civil forfeiture laws that conflict with conservatism in practice. And in fact, quite a bit of these laws that conservatives in the court and state legislature have lauded, defended, and implemented.

Leaving you with one of two options. Either the issue transcends conservatism and liberalism....and is instead the natural product of the low threshold of the law. Or civil forfeiture laws are more perfectly aligned with conservatism, as conservatives given the chance tend to vote laws in that are more severe with fewer protections for the individual.

I'd suggest you join me in the former conclusion. As the latter doesn't paint a pretty picture of conservatives and the alignment of their words with their true principles.

You are damn right that the nation was bat shit crazy before - the entire world was. You understand that the problem is not where we are AT but where we are going. Look at it this way, in our nations past we have fought and moved forward with increasing our freedoms. That has always been one of the greatest things about USA. We ended slavery, fought racism and worked to on equality. I see very little of that now. Certainly there are a few examples - gays are finally allowed to marry in much of the nation and I would bet that will be an issue of the past in less than a decade. Yay, we corrected a failure of this nation for 5% of the population. Meanwhile, the government has essentially declared no one, anywhere has any right to privacy.

Yes and no. Every freedom possessed in the past is still retained now. Go back to the 70s.....and the federal government couldn't tap land lines without a warrant, couldn't open your mail without a warrant. The same applies today. The issue is....we have new technologies that didn't exist in the past. And these are subject to a higher degree of scrutiny than the technology was protected in the past and is still protected now.

When it comes to actual policy, you and I are pretty much on the same page. You're not going to get an ounce of argument from me that 'metadata' downloads shouldn't require a warrant, or that my email keywords should be an open book to the NSA. But how is this functionally different that J. Edgar's system of 'files' on people? I'd say its far less egregious as its far less personal. And in our current system, at least a warrant is needed for any real invasion of privacy. The warrants are little more than rubber stamps, with not one ever having been denied. But due process is met...technically. Its a firewall one level deep. But at least its a firewall. In the past the FBI could do pretty much what it wanted with no oversight and no warrants. And were often used as bludgeoning tools to grind political or personal axes. That doesn't appear to be the case today, at least not to anywhere near the same degree.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying the current situation is cool. I'm saying that at worst, its on par with the past. And given the rollback of many of these programs (sigh....at least officially), we're seeing a degree of responsiveness that's better than the past. And a degree of transparency (albeit not willingly in every case) that's greater than the past. The same technology that makes it easier to consolidate information also makes it harder to hide. And the Freedom of Information Act offers us a window into government actions that is simply unprecedented in our nation's history. A window that the government can, at its whim, cloud. But a window that is far clearer than anything we've had in the past.

And that's my point. Is our system perfect? Fuck no. Is it better than anything we've had in the past. Not just yes but HELL yes.

That being said, I can wrap my head around your arguments about our trendline. I acknowledge that if freedom and liberty were graphed, our trendline in say, the 50 and 60s had a far steeper upward slope than it does now. And that since 911....it hasn't been much more than the horizontal. But I still think we're improving. And will continue to improve. Look at McDonald V. Chicago and the limits to government regulation on guns. Your already acknowledged vast progress on gay marriage. Archaic rules regulating consensual sexual behavior being rolled back in Lawrence v. Texas. 'Protest zones' being ruled unconstitutional.

There have also been setbacks. Citizens United was a disaster, standing as a masturbatory fantasy for every politically motivated trust fund kid in our nation. Kelo V. the City of New London was straight up bullshit. But not utterly inconsistent with the practice in early America. But the preponderance of movement on liberty and freedom has been upward. And I don't see that changing.

Another factor to consider is the alternative. Disbanding a government is a fucking chaotic process. And rarely results in more stability, security and practical freedom as what it overthrew. For every US Constitutional Convention there are 20 squabbling, balkanized politically fractured 'nations' barely able to control what happens within their own borders, and 5 more collapses into civil war. A functioning government with the kind of checks and balances we have......is insanely difficult to establish.

Its much easier to improve the system we have than to upend the chess board and try and reassemble the pieces.

 

[OnePercenter]

The issue is people being caught laundering business monies in personal accounts.

 

[progressive hunter]

 

[FA_Q2]

This thread is 7 years old....

If you got something to say, make a new one.

 

[g5000]

Law Lets I.R.S. Seize Accounts on Suspicion, No Crime Required

ARNOLDS PARK, Iowa — For almost 40 years, Carole Hinders has dished out Mexican specialties at her modest cash-only restaurant. For just as long, she deposited the earnings at a small bank branch a block away — until last year, when two tax agents knocked on her door and informed her that they had seized her funds, almost $33,000.
The Internal Revenue Service agents did not accuse Ms. Hinders of money laundering or cheating on her taxes — in fact, she has not been charged with any crime. Instead, the money was seized solely because she had deposited less than $10,000 at a time, which they viewed as an attempt to avoid triggering a required government report.
“How can this happen?” Ms. Hinders said in a recent interview. “Who takes your money before they prove that you’ve done anything wrong with it?”
The federal government does.

FindLaw's United States Eighth Circuit case and opinions.

FindLaw's searchable database of United States Eighth Circuit decisions since

caselaw.findlaw.com

Hinders won her case in court and got her money back. However, she was not reimbursed for the court fees it cost her to get her money back.

 

[OKTexas]

I am a Libertarian. I want NO government.

.

That would make you an anarchist, not a libertarian.

.

 

[FA_Q2]

FindLaw's United States Eighth Circuit case and opinions.

FindLaw's searchable database of United States Eighth Circuit decisions since

caselaw.findlaw.com

Hinders won her case in court and got her money back. However, she was not reimbursed for the court fees it cost her to get her money back.

2 years.

Man that is insane. They had no rights to take it in the first place, it is a gross violation of your constitutional rights. And no one in Washington is remotely interested in changing practices like this.