Cash strapped local governments are using civil forfeiture laws to steal money from poor minorities and then use the money to finance police and prosecutors.
I could not write any better than the article in the New Yorker entitled "Taken".
Laws we were told would take profits from drug lords, are being used against the totally innocent, or against a person whose son sold $60 worth of marijuana.
I TOLD YOU THIS WOULD HAPPEN. AND I WAS NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO TOLD YOU THIS WOULD HAPPEN!
Drug dealers are not stupid. You civilly forfeiture one drug dealer's Maserati and soon all drug dealers with brains have their Mazeratis registered in the name of a Cayman Island Corporation and hordes of well trained, well paid lawyers show up to fight the forfeiture.
It is WAY easier to take all of the assets of a poor minority person who is too afraid to fight back. It is the same reason that the police tend to arrest more minorities for violation of drug laws. Most of them are too poor and too afraid to fight back. This is why over 50% of the drug arrests nationwide are for possession of marijuana. Since everyone is using marijuana, you just have to stop the nearest black kid to have an arrest and conviction to brag about when asking for more money from the DEA.
BTW, you did see that the DEA admits to routinely lying about the probable cause for an arrest? They think they are allowed to make up a story about how they saw a red light out and stopped the vehicle in order to cover up inadmissible info they got from the NSA.
We need to STOP THE WAR ON DRUGS. Because it is impossible to stop drug trafficking, our law enforcement officers are breaking the law under the pressure to make arrests. And the bribery money available would tempt the devil himself.
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A trillion dollars (spent so far in the War on Drugs)could have paid for a free college education for any who wished to attend. Instead, we got cheaper drugs, more potent drugs, and easier access to drugs for our children. State regulation of marijuana would result in safer borders and neighborhoods, less asset forfeiture, more difficult access for kids, and importantly a restoration of respect for our law enforcement officers who often take the brunt of the public's frustration with these laws. The War on Drugs is primarily a war on marijuana.
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