Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards • Hacker News Board

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#481

Post by slavik81 » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 4:41 PM UTC

cornchips wrote: post #445

downandout wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From [1].... “All of our home towns are sitting on a tax-liberating gold mine,” Deputy Ron Hain of Kane County, Ill., wrote in a self-published book under a pseudonym. Hain is a marketing specialist for Desert Snow, a leading interdiction training firm based in Guthrie, Okla., whose founders also created Black Asphalt. Desert Snow created civil forfeiture training seminars for law enforcement. Black Asphalt is a syst…

Owning a business related and supposedly selling to law enforcement while being employed by the force... Conflict of interest, anyone?

That's probably only a conflict on interest if they are involved in making purchasing decisions. Your mileage may vary. Always ask your ethics councillor.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#482

Post by wepple » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 4:58 PM UTC

sbuttgereit wrote: post #269

Digit-Al wrote: post #255

As an Englishman, I have a couple of questions for you Americans on here. 1) Does anyone know who came up with these "civil asset forfeitures"? (Personally, they seem most un-civil to me.) 2) Can any of you defend America as "the land of the free" when more of the population are in prison than in almost any other country in the word and the police not only have the power to strip you of your property and assets witho…

1) The history in the U.S., it is probably fair to say, is primarily tied up in various prohibition laws, most recently drug prohibition. Though some of the precedent apparently can be traced back to British Maritime Law ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United... ) 2) Not if they're intellectually honest about it. If one reads the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution in context and…

can you recommend a book for someone who wants to understand more about the US - IE what the declaration of independence and constitution are, and how the US got to where it is now? covering history and politics and anything else useful to really grok these types of discussions?

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#483

Post by 15charlimit » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 4:58 PM UTC

harryh wrote: post #454

JetSpiegel wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#484

Post by tripzilch » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:03 PM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #464

voidz wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mhm. I'll bite. Got a source? Government wants kill people who use a lot of Oxycontin to kill the people who snort it or something?

Acetaminophen is added to many prescription opiates in part to prevent abuse. (There's some question as to whether it aids in pain reduction beyond what the opiate would provide, but it certainly has near term implications for severe abuse.)

There's no question. Unlike, say, ibuprofen and acetaminophen, there is no "synergy bonus".

The added pain reduction effect of acetaminophen stands in no relation to what the opioid is doing. There's no research anywhere showing that the combined effect is any more than the literal addition of taking both (for which there would be no reason if you could just as easily take a tiny bit more of the opioid that you'd be taking any way).

All it does is take away an addict's choice not to wreck their liver. And the system encourages the availability of this unnecessarily dangerous substance by awarding it a less restrictive drug schedule.

The incentives are rather twisted in this particular case.

edit

> but it certainly has near term implications for severe abuse.

the implications being death and permanent liver damage (it's not actually stopping addicts). but looking only at the numbers, it seems to limit abuse, even in the near term. ugh.

edit 2 seeing some of the other comments, apparently it's not just this particular case. I only knew about this one

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#485

Post by drewgross » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:08 PM UTC

Gibbon1 wrote: post #413

tamana wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know legal protections apply to criminals, but it is hard to win a political battle against the cops who busted a big time dealer of life-destroying drugs (heroin)

Among the friends I knew the body count is Prescription Drugs: 2 Alcohol: 3 Heroin: 0 Methamphetamine: 0 Cannabis: 0 Two people I know. Their brothers both died from Oxycontin(tm). Specifically pulmonary talcosis. You get pulmonary talcosis from the talc government made the manufacturer add specifically to kill junkies.

How about the friends who died of the drug as a fraction of the friends who used the drug? If you don't know anyone who uses heroin, this post is meaningless.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#486

Post by harryh » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:23 PM UTC

incongruity wrote: post #478

harryh wrote: post #456

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do agree with this actually. Rather that going straight to law enforcement budgets the money should go to the general coffers to be allocated by the legislature.

I'd rather see it directed, specifically, to needed public goods. Otherwise it becomes just another generic revenue source (i.e.: a tax) and, over-time, it becomes all too tempting to still milk it for more money. Red light cameras are a good example of this. Revenues from them (in Chicago, at least) went to the city's general fund. That didn't stop the city from reducing yellow light times to increase revenues.

I like that goal too, but I'm not sure how to really do that. A lot of states direct all lottery money to education but that just allows the states to spend less on education out of the general fund. Ultimately money is a fungible thing. No way around that.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#487

Post by harryh » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:26 PM UTC

15charlimit wrote: post #483

harryh wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#488

Post by harryh » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:27 PM UTC

geggam wrote: post #480

harryh wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize you can be arrested and held in jail before a trial right? That's exactly same thing as confiscating assets pending a trial.

only for a short period of time before getting to address a judge

That's actually not true at all. You can be held in jail for months pending completion of a trial depending on your ability to make bail and the seriousness of the crime in question.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#489

Post by harryh » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:27 PM UTC

CamperBob2 wrote: post #472

harryh wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is due process for civil asset forfeiture.

There's a process, but it's not "due" to anything but avarice and corruption.

It's actually due to the well established legal procedures of our country.

Re: Police use new device to seize money in bank accounts or on prepaid cards

#490

Post by tripzilch » Thu, Jun 09, 2016, 5:43 PM UTC

trbvm2 wrote: post #421

cehrnrooth wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems questionable, how can they charge you with obstruction when you can just not answer any questions you're not legally obligated to answer.

I tried to write the long answer and it turned out as a wall of text composed of parenthetical caveats. Then I tried to right the short answer and it turned out as a medium length yet confusing answer. The truth of the matter is that people are barely evolved ape/chimps and do pretty much whatever suites them as long as they don't get their ass kicked for it.

Thanks! I'm saving this comment for its general applicability to, unfortunately, anything.