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Sunday, May 02, 2010

Ind. Law - "Police reaping more drug money"

Some quotes from a long story today by Jeff Wiehe of the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette:

In recent years, both the Fort Wayne Police and Allen County Sheriff’s departments have seized a growing amount of money in federal cases. Unlike in state-level cases, police agencies can keep a large amount of the cash they take in federal cases.

A study released last month by the Institute for Justice – a non-profit, libertarian organization – graded each state on its police seizure laws and how law enforcement used such laws. The report, “Policing for Profit,” gave Indiana a C+.

Indiana’s state laws, which do not allow law enforcement to gain monetarily from seizing money, were given a B+ by the study’s authors. The grade was lowered because in Indiana, police have the option of following federal laws that let them keep more cash after a seizure.

But officials with both the Fort Wayne Police and Allen County Sheriff’s departments said the reason for the rise in federal seizures is not to make a buck. Rather, more and more cases are meeting the standards of prosecution as federal crimes.

Basically, officials said they are finding suspects with larger amounts of drugs in their possession or working longer-term cases that expose larger drug operations.

“I think if you have someone in office doing that, they shouldn’t be in office,” Allen County Sheriff Ken Fries said in response to the notion of profit-motivated police work. “You do not go out and enforce the laws to make money. You go out and enforce the laws to protect people.”

After police confiscate money or property during the course of a case, it becomes a civil court matter involving the Allen County Prosecutor’s Office or the U.S. Department of Justice.

The county prosecutor’s office files 100 to 120 such confiscation cases a year, said Deputy Prosecutor Jack Roebel, who handles the local cases.

Most involve people found with drugs, drug paraphernalia, cash or a combination of the three.

“If I’m a police officer and I stop a person, and they have cash and drugs, my argument is that the cash was either to purchase the drugs or made from the sale of drugs,” Roebel said.

Unlike in criminal court, Roebel does not have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the money or property he’s seeking to confiscate is connected to crime.

“My burden of proof is substantially lower than a criminal case,” Roebel said. “I just have to be able to prove to the court that there is some reason to believe the property I’m seeking to forfeit was related to crime.”

At the state level, police and prosecutors can use a seizure to recoup the cost of pursuing that case. They must submit documentation of how much they spent, and they cannot keep more than that total. Any excess goes into the state’s education fund.

“There’s no financial gain for anybody,” Roebel said.

In federal cases, though, police can keep up to 80 percent of money they seize. When more than one agency is involved, that money is divided according to how much time each agency put into the case.

Capt. Jim Feasel of the Fort Wayne Police Vice and Narcotics Unit said a case can be pursued in federal court only if it meets certain requirements. The amount of drugs or money involved plays a part, he said, as do other factors.

“The reason we go federal, it’s not because it’s more bang for the buck, it’s because we have enough information to meet federal guidelines,” Feasel said. “But a lot of times, we don’t have enough.” * * *

In any case, law enforcement officials said, anyone has the opportunity to prove in court that their seized money came from legal means.

“The problem is, forfeiture cases proceed just as any other civil case,” said local attorney Quinton Ellis, who represents some clients trying to get their money back from law enforcement. “It presents an issue for people who have funds forfeited.”

These people must hire a lawyer, and there may be court fees involved. Some cases he can’t take because the clients would be fighting for less money than they’d eventually have to pay him for his time, he said.

“More often than not, it’s just a few hundred dollars, but I’m going to have to put in many, many hours of my time,” Ellis said. “More often than not, people throw up their hands.”

Still, Ellis said that as in any civil case, the two sides can sometimes settle.

Here is a long list of earlier ILB entries on drug forfeitures.

The study referenced in the story is titled "Policing for Profit." Access it here. From the summary:

Policing for Profit: The Abuse of Civil Asset Forfeiture chronicles how state and federal laws leave innocent property owners vulnerable to forfeiture abuse and encourage law enforcement to take property to boost their budgets. The report finds that by giving law enforcement a direct financial stake in forfeiture efforts, most state and federal laws encourage policing for profit, not justice.

Policing for Profit also grades the states on how well they protect property owners—only three states receive a B or better. And in most states, public accountability is limited as there is little oversight or reporting about how police and prosecutors use civil forfeiture or spend the proceeds.

Federal laws encourage even more civil forfeiture abuse through a loophole called “equitable sharing” that allows law enforcement to circumvent even the limited protections of state laws. With equitable sharing, law enforcement agencies can and do profit from forfeitures they wouldn’t be able to under state law.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 2, 2010 04:33 PM
Posted to Indiana Law