Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Years. What Will SCOTUS Do?

Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by soneil on Friday September 01, 2023 @02:39PM (#37354619)

You should read up on civil asset forfeiture - it's hilariously obtuse.

They arrest your money. You are not accused of a crime, your money is. Your money is not a person, and thus has no constitutional rights. Your money is not innocent until proven, that's a silly system reserved for persons - instead, your money must prove its innocence. And thus you get cases with absurd titles such as "United States v. $84,740.00 U.S. Currency" ( https://casetext.com/case/us-v-8474000-us-currency )

I'd love to say you can't make this up, but they did.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by cdchn on Friday September 01, 2023 @02:50PM (#37354734)

Here's even more absurd: United States v. Forty Barrels and Twenty Kegs of Coca-Cola

A federal suit under which the government unsuccessfully attempted to force the Coca-Cola Company to remove caffeine from its product.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by danbruc on Friday September 01, 2023 @02:50PM (#37354743)

I remember some discussion here quite some time ago where somebody brought this up and linked to a list of the strangest cases, I still remember something like United States vs. a few tons of fish.

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Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by cdchn on Friday September 01, 2023 @02:51PM (#37354755)

Wikipedia's list of "in rem" cases has a lot of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:United_States_in_rem_...

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Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by danbruc on Friday September 01, 2023 @02:53PM (#37354783)

There it is. Seemingly it was not against complete fish.

United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Approximately...

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Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by cdchn on Friday September 01, 2023 @03:38PM (#37355298)

I see one case against complete animals in US vs. 15 Impounded Cats.

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Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by tempodox on Friday September 01, 2023 @04:13PM (#37355685)

In the middle ages they had a lawsuit against the woodworms that ate a pulpit because a preacher fell when it eventually broke down, but one can always optimize for more absurdity.

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Re:Police Seized Innocent Peoples Property, Kept It for Year... by winrid on Friday September 01, 2023 @04:22PM (#37355774)

United States v. One Solid Gold Object in Form of a Rooster

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._One_Solid_G...

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