So if it's clear that a person is in possession of illegally obtained property, but it's a mystery exactly how they got it so law enforcement can't indict them for a crime, they should just get to keep it?

If how the individual came into possession of the property is a mystery, how is it clear the property was illegally obtained? I would be hard-pressed to prove that many of my assets truly belong to me.

Edit: all of this is off-topic, as the bank can be proven the owner and the police would not keep the money.

If it's "clear" the money result from illegal activity, they will be charged with a crime. Surely you are not advocating replacing the courts with truthiness and gut feelings?

No, I'm just saying that the legal standard for proving that property (usually money) was obtained illegally is lower than the legal standard for convicting someone for a crime and throwing them in jail.

Asset forfeiture is, and always has been, subject to judicial oversight.

The entire point of this story (and others like it) is precisely that there is NO judicial oversight over this kind of police theft.

That is a misreading of the story. This story outlines a method that allows law enforcement to confiscate money stored on pre-paid credit cards in a similar fashion to how they've previously confiscated cash. It says nothing at all about judicial oversite.

There are, in fact, well established and relatively simple procedures for contesting civil forfeiture. There is a fair argument to be made that they sometimes don't work as well as they should but when you say that there is "NO judicial oversight" at all you are just just flat out wrong. You need to update your worldview if you want it to conform to reality.