UTAH: LEGALIZED THEFT NEEDS STATEWIDE REFORM
INCREASINGLY HAPPENING IN ALL
STATES - HAS THIS
HAPPENED TO YOU??
The following op-ed, written by our policy analyst Josh Daniels, was published this week in the Deseret News.
25 Mar 2016 11:18 AM PDT
If you didn’t, you’re in a comfortable
majority according to a new
poll of 565 Utah voters conducted last week by Public Policy Polling.
77 percent of Utah voters are unaware of this legal tool called 'civil asset
forfeiture'.
Asset forfeiture allows 'government' agents
to seize and permanently retain items of value they suspect were
involved in criminal activity. In these cases, you are not the defendant — your
property is, thus leading to court cases such as Salt Lake City v. $20,000
cash.
And unlike a criminal case where you are presumed to be innocent until
proven guilty, a civil asset forfeiture case finds your property guilty at the
outset. You can recover it only if you prove its innocence — its lack of
involvement in the alleged criminal conduct.
Did you know that the 'government' can
legally steal your property without charging you with -- let alone
convicting you of -- a crime?
If you didn’t, you’re in a
comfortable majority according
to a new poll of 565 Utah voters conducted last week by Public Policy
Polling. 77 percent of Utah voters are unaware of this legal tool called 'civil
asset forfeiture'.
Asset forfeiture allows
'government' agents to seize and permanently retain items of value they suspect
were involved in criminal activity. In these cases, you are not the
defendant — your property is, thus leading to court cases such as Salt Lake
City v. $20,000 cash. And unlike a criminal case where you are presumed to be
innocent until proven guilty, a civil asset forfeiture case finds your property
guilty at the outset. You can recover it only if you prove its innocence — its
lack of involvement in the alleged criminal conduct.
Civil asset forfeiture
laws in this country, originally aimed at fighting organized crime and the drug
trade, routinely
ensnare innocent owners who are stopped at the wrong place at the wrong time. Unfortunately, it is
often the unbanked and underprivileged — those who use and carry cash and those
who live or work in high crime areas — who are most susceptible to being caught
up in civil forfeiture and subjected to the legal theft of their property.
Individuals with the least resources and access to justice are unable to effectively fight such seizures. If $3,000 in cash is seized by the police, to be forfeited by the prosecutor, an innocent owner is unlikely to contest the legal theft if hiring an attorney would exceed the amount they could recover. This effectively creates a threshold under which property can be taken by the 'government' without a fight. Unsurprisingly, then, the data shows that in 2015, 74 percent of all forfeiture cases statewide were under $5,000.
While the Utah Legislature debated a proposal this year to reform civil asset forfeiture laws and build additional protections for innocent owners, the bill faced significant opposition from 'government' agencies that conduct (and financially benefit from) forfeiture. These legislative discussions usually pit property rights advocates against the 'government' agents who conduct civil forfeitures, while the voice of everyday Utahns is absent.
In 2000, Utahns passed a statewide ballot initiative securing significant protections for property owners against forfeiture. However, since that time the Legislature has on several occasions eroded the legal protections enacted into law by Utah voters, making forfeitures easier for the 'government'.
But Utahns have not forgotten their support for property rights. The poll referenced above shows that Utahns overwhelmingly oppose the 'government’s' power to seize and keep private property under civil asset forfeiture laws. According to the poll, 86 percent of Utah voters believe that the 'government' “should not be able seize and permanently take away property from people who have not been charged with a crime.” And yet, this is precisely what Utah’s current civil asset forfeiture laws permit. Your car, cash, computer or other property can be taken by the 'government' even if you are completely innocent of committing any crime.
The laws of most states and the federal 'government', in fact, permit police to seize property in this way. While Utah’s law is in need of further reform, this is very much a national issue that deserves greater attention by elected officials, as well as those aspiring to win the presidency this fall. Sixty-six percent of polled Utah voters said they would be more likely to support a candidate for 'president' who took a position in favor of requiring a criminal conviction before property can be seized.
This year’s failed legislative reforms, sponsored by Rep. Brian Greene, would have required the 'government' to prove a criminal connection or “nexus” between the property and the alleged criminal conduct of an individual. In other words, it would have confined the seizure of property to cases where the alleged suspect was charged — and if found innocent, the property would be returned.
Due process exists for a very important purpose and is designed to protect us all from over reach because People are not perfect, neither is the 'government'. The extraordinary power for 'government' to seize our property must be carefully limited to actual criminal activity, ensuring that innocent owners are protected throughout. We can do better. We must do better.
Individuals with the least resources and access to justice are unable to effectively fight such seizures. If $3,000 in cash is seized by the police, to be forfeited by the prosecutor, an innocent owner is unlikely to contest the legal theft if hiring an attorney would exceed the amount they could recover. This effectively creates a threshold under which property can be taken by the 'government' without a fight. Unsurprisingly, then, the data shows that in 2015, 74 percent of all forfeiture cases statewide were under $5,000.
While the Utah Legislature debated a proposal this year to reform civil asset forfeiture laws and build additional protections for innocent owners, the bill faced significant opposition from 'government' agencies that conduct (and financially benefit from) forfeiture. These legislative discussions usually pit property rights advocates against the 'government' agents who conduct civil forfeitures, while the voice of everyday Utahns is absent.
In 2000, Utahns passed a statewide ballot initiative securing significant protections for property owners against forfeiture. However, since that time the Legislature has on several occasions eroded the legal protections enacted into law by Utah voters, making forfeitures easier for the 'government'.
But Utahns have not forgotten their support for property rights. The poll referenced above shows that Utahns overwhelmingly oppose the 'government’s' power to seize and keep private property under civil asset forfeiture laws. According to the poll, 86 percent of Utah voters believe that the 'government' “should not be able seize and permanently take away property from people who have not been charged with a crime.” And yet, this is precisely what Utah’s current civil asset forfeiture laws permit. Your car, cash, computer or other property can be taken by the 'government' even if you are completely innocent of committing any crime.
The laws of most states and the federal 'government', in fact, permit police to seize property in this way. While Utah’s law is in need of further reform, this is very much a national issue that deserves greater attention by elected officials, as well as those aspiring to win the presidency this fall. Sixty-six percent of polled Utah voters said they would be more likely to support a candidate for 'president' who took a position in favor of requiring a criminal conviction before property can be seized.
This year’s failed legislative reforms, sponsored by Rep. Brian Greene, would have required the 'government' to prove a criminal connection or “nexus” between the property and the alleged criminal conduct of an individual. In other words, it would have confined the seizure of property to cases where the alleged suspect was charged — and if found innocent, the property would be returned.
Due process exists for a very important purpose and is designed to protect us all from over reach because People are not perfect, neither is the 'government'. The extraordinary power for 'government' to seize our property must be carefully limited to actual criminal activity, ensuring that innocent owners are protected throughout. We can do better. We must do better.
Utahns expect and demand it.
1 comment:
I am not a lawyer, I don't know a damn thing. I didn't create you.
I only have imagination, opinions, thoughts that get created and destroyed based on what I want to keep and remember or ignore. I do not represent you either, and wouldn't want to.
My opinion:
They are employees working a few hours.
They hide behind the corporate veil.
If you only see the corporation and only talk to people giving the corporation name, you help them hide.
Say John Fourty Ounce works for City Polic[e]y control business.
John Fourty Ounce jacks you around, has your property towed and gives you a contract with an amount he claims you owe because he accused you of some nonsense.
When you get around your family, all you talk about is City Polic[e]y did this and City Polic[e] did that, and you even try to sue City Polic[e]y.
They love you and you will lose. Cause you still see the corporate veil.
Now if you take your complaint naming John Fourty Ounce to the DA and say what he did, and you report John Fourty Ounce to every agency you can think of, and state what happened to you; now John Fourty Ounce has his name in a database and is watched for further activity that makes him get more complaints.
The more complaints John Fourty Ounce gets, the more he becomes a liability to the people who hired him.
You do that for every encounter you have, where they are interfering with your rights, and you will see change.
But sitting around talking about corporations by name, even three letter corporations, is you saying..."what can we do?"" all whiney and said, and waiting on an alien to give you a free ride so if they don't give you what you want you'll be all whiney with them too! Maybe they'll eat you, cause you don't know nothing about them and you trust them to save you so they might as well save you and get something in return for the 'free ride'.
NO gas, no grass, no ass, no free ride.
You want to vote for another one of them?
Those that have leaders and representatives, I will not feel sorry if they round you up as their property who want them to represent you. Cause if they only have 10 square miles to regulate your life, and decide to bring you closer so they can really govern you, well hell, you asked for it, so who am I to get involved in your need to vote and have a leader?
For those who are truly independent, and self governed and are not registered, and aren't afraid to say you are not affiliated with any governing group, and can walk your mile on your own if no one wants to walk with you, then you can see there is remedy for you when someone does you wrong.
Silence is acquiescence, and waiting on a galactic to do your work is also acquiescence. You get the information about the created equal male or female who came against you and don't fight them by going to war, document them by filing complaints.
When they start job searching, those complaints are there.
Judges have judicial conduct committees or something similar.
Lawyers have BAR association, and their insurance will be affected depending on how bad they are at doing their job.
Cops, judges, attorneys, agents, principals, lawyers, clerks, secretaries, people who come against you, there is the FBI for filing complaints, civil rights if you have to, the FTC for filing complaints, identity theft if you are making you perform contracts they created, there is the BAR, there is the state attorney general office, the department of justice, and yeah, their minions will get on here and tell you all these agencies are worthless and don't use them.
You will listen because that's what you do. You let people tell you what to do, and get mad when someone won't listen to you.
Individual Accountability for Corporate Wrongdoing
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