FEAR-List Bulletin posted by journalist Vin Suprynowicz (The Libertarian column), 1/16/96

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear an appeal from the Clinton administration, seeking to overturn lower court rulings which have held that using the civil courts to seize the property of a defendant who has already been convicted in criminal court - or vice versa - constitutes double jeopardy.

Under the bizarre legalities of civil seizures - which date from the days when the British crown would seize smugglers' ships even after they were abandoned by their crews - the government actually sues the house, boat, car, plane or factory "used" in a crime. Needless to say, protections for the "civil rights" of these inanimate objects are minimal.

Lower court rulings in California and Michigan found double-jeopardy, because a jury considering a jail sentence may have no idea the defendant has already lost his home or business to separate government action.

Prosecutors complain that has led many defendants to request the dismissal of criminal charges or convictions in cases involving civil forfeitures.

In its appeal to the Supreme Court, the Clinton administration argues that forfeiture of drug-related property is not punishment.

But that's absurd. The very fact that courts can and often do assess fines in lieu of jail time shows that depriving a citizen of property constitutes a punishment, just as surely as taking away his liberty.

The fact that civil asset seizures are "easier" and more "streamlined," far from being a reason to endorse them, only highlights how dangerous they can be.

Around the country, law enforcement agencies are now widely allowed to supplement their budgets by retaining a percentage of assets seized. Not only does this allow them to grow beyond the normal restraints imposed by taxpayers, it also creates an obvious temptation to use civil forfeitures indiscriminately, as a fund-raising technique.

This objection is not merely theoretical. It's well-documented that a police force in one Florida county had gotten into the habit of pulling over the cars of blacks and Hispanics, seizing their cash, and leaving the citizen to prove the money was not the product of some allegedly illegal act.

Federal agents use the same technique against those who commit such "suspicious activities" as buying airline tickets with cash. In a majority of such cases, no criminal charges are ever filed.

Here in Las Vegas, pilot Billy Munnerlyn had his plane seized by federal officials when the man who chartered a flight turned out to be a suspected drug dealer transporting cash in locked file cabinets. Even though he was never charged with a crime, the government effectively put Mr. Munnerlyn out of business, making him pay to get his own plane back, at which point he found it had been virtually ruined.

The killing of Donald Scott in 1994, at his isolated ranch in the mountains about Malibu, Calif., involved park rangers who had attempted without success to buy Mr. Scott's property to add to an adjoining park.

Just before the raid, agents from various jurisdictions reviewed a map of the territory they intended to seize and annex after Scott's "marijuana bust." When the plainclothes agents broke into his kitchen and Mr. Scott's wife screamed for help, Mr. Scott ran down the stairs with a gun. He was shot and killed. No marijuana was ever found.

Not since the famously corrupt witch trials of the Middle Ages have law enforcement agents been so tempted to pad their own budgets, in a "guilty-till-proven-innocent" procedure which turns the traditional American sense of justice on its head.

The high court's decision to review such multiple prosecutions is welcome. But not for the reason the Clinton administration seems to think.

It's time to end this corrupt and corrupting practice, for good.