Do Nothing Wrong, Forfeit Your Money
Ed Brayton on Aug 21st 2006
Thanks to Mike Horn for sending me a link to this story about a guy convicted of a drug crime for nothing more than carring a lot of cash. Emiliano Gomez Gonzolez was pulled over while driving a rental car. He had a cooler with almost $125,000 in cash in it, which the police claimed was connected to drug trafficking and seized. The 8th circuit court of appeals upheld that seizure last week in an absolutely stunning decision. See the full ruling here.
The government’s case here is laughable. When they found the money, they took Gonzolez and the rental car to the police station and had a drug dog sniff it over. The dog indicated that there was drug residue on the money. But studies have shown that over 75% of the bills in circulation have drug residue on them. The cops tested this by having the dog sniff the money found in the car and then sniff a total of 7 bills from police officers, and the dog reacted to the cash found in the car, not to the cash from the police. And that’s it, folks. That is the sum total of the evidence against him.
On the other hand, consider that the man had no prior record at all of drug involvement. Consider that three people testified at the trial, and produced documentation, that they had pooled their money and sent the man to Chicago to purchase a refrigerated truck for the produce business they were starting (when he got there, he found out the truck had already been sold). Consider that none of those men had any record of drug involvement either, and that the government could not impeach their testimony at all.
The lower court ruled against the government and for the defendant. The government then appealed and the 8th circuit, in a 2-1 decision, overturned the lower court. The dissenting judge in the case had a rather scathing reply:
“Notwithstanding the fact that claimants seemingly suspicious activities were reasoned away with plausible, and thus presumptively trustworthy, explanations which the government failed to contradict or rebut, I note that no drugs, drug paraphernalia, or drug records were recovered in connection with the seized money,” Judge Lay wrote. “There is no evidence claimants were ever convicted of any drug-related crime, nor is there any indication the manner in which the currency was bundled was indicative of
drug use or distribution.”“Finally, the mere fact that the canine alerted officers to the presence of drug residue in a rental car, no doubt driven by dozens, perhaps scores, of patrons during the course of a given year, coupled with the fact that the alert came from the same location where the currency was discovered, does little to connect the money to a controlled substance offense,” Judge Lay Concluded.
Here’s what is most appalling about this case, and many others like it: the standard of evidence is lower. Because the government defines seizures of property as a civil proceeding rather than a criminal one, the standard of proof is not “beyond a reasonable doubt”, as in criminal cases, but “a preponderance of the evidence”. Thus, they can seize your property, claiming that it was the result of an illegal activity, without ever convicting you of the crime from which it allegedly was obtained.
Gonzolez was not charged with any crime because there was no evidence of any crime, yet they confiscated $125,000 based on the civil forfeiture laws without showing any crime had been committed by anyone connected to the money. This is absolutely outrageous. This case needs to be appealed to the Supreme Court and they need to put a stop to this madness.
Filed in The Basement |
Here! Here! I completely agree. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
The first sentence says the guy was convicted, but the last paragraph says he wasn’t even charged. What’s the deal?
asg — You’re right. I would suggest “attainted” as the more appropriate initial verb. It’s antiquated, and not quite precise either, but it seems to fit better than any other I can call to mind.
Abuses of power like this one (and others covered in the source website) are alarming and need to be stopped . . . but will they ever be? Better question is CAN they ever be stopped?
The majority of the voters in the U.S. are poor citizens who are too lazy (mentally) to take their power seriously — they have (and will continue to) elected their representatives based on looks and rhetoric instead of research and clear thought, and they pay for their choices by lost liberties and abused freedoms.
This is the majority that’s running the country — running it into the ground — these are the same people who are the prey of scam artists (among them politicians) and who are always looking for something for nothing.
Its almost as scary as terrorism!
Note to self: don’t carry more than $500 cash, not because its more likely to be stolen or lost, but because The Decider’s Government might confiscate it and throw me in jail.
[…] NPR ran a story today about the drug forfeiture case that Brayton blogged yesterday. Even while I know full well who calls the tune at National, ahem, Public Radio, the piece treated the seizure of assets from an innocent man as a mere curiosity, a legal quirk that we should all try to understand — rather than the outrage that it is. If you plan to carry large amounts of cash, “use new bills,” said the legal expert that they interviewed. […]
I think it is the evidence very strongly supports (99%+) that he is indeed engaged in illegal activities. But they certainly don’t have proof beyond a reasonable doubt for any specific crime thus the money should be given back until such time as they can say exactly what he did (and a vague indication that he was somehow involved with drugs does not qualify) and charge him in a court of law. Clearly no one is safe if the government can take one’s property without a conviction in open court.
With the reasoning the government is using here, it might as well say 99% of drivers sometimes speed and thus it is okay fine and randomly pull people over and fine them on the basis that they are drivers.
Meanwhile I would introduce Mr. Gonzolez to this thing called a bank. It has many wonderful services that can be used by people with that kind of money including far safer storage and transfer of monetary wealth.
Now wait just a minute here, Michael.
Since when did banking become compulsory, on pain of arbitrarily forfeiting your money? Sounds like a racket set up by the banks, if you ask me, and that’s not how “legal tender” money is meant to work.
Where did I say that banking was compulsory?
And to claim that suggest that I suggested that not using one was grounds for forfeiting money is a false presentation of what I said: indeed I suggested the exact oppose. If the government can’t prove that Gonzolez did a very specific crime than it has no grounds to keep the money. The money should be GIVEN BACK to Gonzolez.
That being said, if Gonzolez was not up to something illegal, he was being very stupid. There is a reason why people almost never carry that kind of cash around: it too easy to get robbed, destroyed, lost. Not to mention the risk of what happend in this case. The cost of using some kind of financial institution is trivial compared to the risks of not doing so. Indeed, pretty much nothing good could possibly come out of carrying that kind of cash unless one likes being mugged. The vast majority of people who are not some kind of conspiracy theorists understand this. That is why carrying such sums of money is correctly considered to be suspicious. That he also lied to the police, etc. only increases the suspicion.
But people should NOT face penalities for merely acting in a suspicous manner. They should only face penalities for proven violations of the law. The only evidence beyond the suspicious activity was the drug traces on the money which is worthless evidence. I will make no bones that unless he was being stupid or paranoid, was almost certainly doing something that would get him in trouble. I see no reason to assume that it had to be drugs either. The most the government can say is that he probably did something illegal. Which brings back to my speeding example. Virtually all drivers have illegally exceeded the speed limit or committed some other kind of traffic infraction that they have not been charged with. The government can’t say that 99% of drivers speed, so we will assume you speed, and punish you for it. No, the government has to say: John Smith, drove 29 MPH in at 20 MPH zone at 11:30 AM on August 24, 2006 and then provide some sort of evidence for it. Gonzolez has only done things which usually indicates some kind of illegal activity. Not good enough.
Now for what really came back for. Look at the following outrage: Police property: It’s finders keepers in NH Here the NH Supreme court rules that because someone might have done something wrong justifies forfeiture. Maybe the person in question did violate the law, but a specific violation of the law was not shown. Thus the ruling was an outrage much like the Gonzolez case.
Michael,
If the failure to keep your large sums of money in a bank means that you stand a good chance of losing it — on no further evidence whatsoever — then, for large sums of money, banking is compulsory. On pain, as I said, of forfeiting your money. You may not have said as much, but it is the de facto result of the asset forfeiture laws.
Perhaps Mr. Gonzales was indeed being stupid. But I do not think that the law exists to protect people from their own stupidity. And I also can’t see how the law would even advance that objective, if we, as a society, say “ah, you’re stupid, therefore your money must be transferred to the government.” (And by what theory of justice could we possibly arrive at that result?)
unless he was being stupid or paranoid, was almost certainly doing something that would get him in trouble.
I’d agree, actually, but I don’t believe that the government has any proper claim over the money of the stupid or the paranoid. He should face no penalties at all, unless he was found — beyond a reasonable doubt — to have been breaking the law. Asset forfeture laws subvert all that, which is why they are so unjust.
The most the government can say is that he probably did something illegal.
I’m not so sure about how probable this is. To my cynical mind, there are, I think, nearly as many simple paranoiacs and idiots in the United States as there are criminals. Perhaps more, even.
Really, if I had to guess what was happening here, I’d say that perhaps one or more of Mr. Gonzales’ associates may have been undocumented immigrants. They wanted a cut of the business, but they couldn’t do this by starting a bank account, which would leave a paper trail. Therefore they dealt in cash.
[…] Because, you know, asset forfeiture just works so well in stopping illegal drugs. Here’s the text of the bill. […]