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U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

nytimes.com

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Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#61

Post by wool_gather »

saas_sam wrote: post #40
colmmacc wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a permanent resident who lives in the US, the idea that basic protections of law should only apply to citizens is terrifying. It's not the same outcome at all. Due process is afforded to "persons".

No country on Earth affords equal rights to citizens and non-citizens. If this "terrifies" you, I encourage you to reflect on your fears and whether some of them may be disproportionate to reality.

Parent said "protections" and referred to "due process", not the broader topic of "rights". So, yes, non-citizens don't, e.g., get to vote. On the other hand, if they get arrested, the same standards of evidence apply as for a citizen.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#62

Post by Theodores »

DontGiveTwoFlux wrote: post #2

A swipe against excessive civil forfeitures succeeds. These aggressive actions require citizens to forfeit property far in excess of any harm committed. In the court case, a man had his car seized when caught selling a few hundred dollars of heroine. We have laws to punish illegal behavior, but it’s not right that all your property get snatched up too. The most egregious of these cases often involve no due process at…

> In the court case, a man had his car seized when caught selling a few hundred dollars of heroine.

Interesting perspective there. Some people think that heroin dealers deserve to be fully hung, drawn and quartered, their head placed on a spike to be pecked at by the crows.

Others might think that 'it was just a bit of dope, why should he have to forfeit anything for that?'.

The car is potentially proceeds of crime it also enables the crime of dealing to be carried out. A reasonable case for him forfeiting it can definitely be made without that being the police preying off the 'victim'. In the UK any police action that leads to people losing stuff as it is deemed proceeds of crime goes to the crown, i.e. the queen, rather than to the local police department. In the USA you need something similar so that the police can't be accused of being on the take.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#63

Post by AnimalMuppet »

This is good.

Even better: It's a unanimous decision. The Supreme Court is not even close to thinking that this was OK.

(Yes, Thomas agreed with the decision, though he wanted to state that he got there by a different route. That's not bad - it gives two distinct reasons why the ruling is correct, which is better than just one.)

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#64

Post by rc_kas »

DigiMortal wrote: post #50
jayd16 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What situation? That she wrote the opinion? In the US Supreme Court the tradition is that there is only a single majority opinion written with a single named author.

No, that she might be dead or in a vegetative state.

That's not a situation, that's just a dumb conspiracy theory.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#65

Post by sbov »

mikeyouse wrote: post #46
runako wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Thomas just wanted to use a different clause of the 14th amendment to achieve the same outcome. Do you read anything into this? Is there a reason a justice would prefer to highlight the excessive fines provision over the due process protections?

Abortion. And immigration. "This may seem like a minor niggling point. It's not. The Court's recognition of a right to abortion has been rooted in the Due Process Clause. Thomas & Gorsuch's concurrences document their opposition to grounding substantive rights in that corner of the 14th am." https://twitter.com/stevenmazie/status/1098242972162768901 "Thomas and Gorsuch announce that they would incorporate Bill of Rig…

Wouldn't this completely screw over corporations? Or do we have some other mechanisms that will continue to protect them from these abuses them but not other types of "persons"?

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#66

Post by bitwize »

repiret wrote: post #51
burtonator wrote: post #26

What's frustrating here is that so much of our government depends on actual case law. This it's possible for massive injustice to happen for decades before we have a resolution. This is one of the reasons technology can be so frightening because there's no case law and the rate of technology is exponential which means there is the potential for GREAT evil to happen without any resolution except to fight it out and ge…

The alternative to case law is that ambiguities in the statute are interpreted differently each time. Being subject to the law, I would much rather live in a system designed to automatically reduce ambiguities over time, rather than to have to wait for the legislature to have the political will and resources to address them.

The USA is a common-law jurisdiction which means that convention and "how things were always done" have outsized significance when compared to civil-law jurisdictions like much of western Europe. Civil-law jurisdictions tend to rely more on statute, but they also have legislatures that can actually get things done, rather than cultivate this bogus adversarial relationship between the people and the government wherein the government is obstructed or hindered from getting all but the most critical and unanimously supported things done.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#67

Post by Tomte »

saas_sam wrote: post #40
colmmacc wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a permanent resident who lives in the US, the idea that basic protections of law should only apply to citizens is terrifying. It's not the same outcome at all. Due process is afforded to "persons".

No country on Earth affords equal rights to citizens and non-citizens. If this "terrifies" you, I encourage you to reflect on your fears and whether some of them may be disproportionate to reality.

Germany provides many Basic Rights to everybody.

Others are only for citizens (and EU citizens, but via a strange legal method), but the most fundamental ones state "Everyone", not "every citizen".

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#68

Post by [deleted] »

ls612 wrote: post #14
whatshisface wrote: post #6

> Justice Thomas agreed with the result in the case, Timbs v. Indiana, No. 17-1091, but said he would have gotten to the same place by a different route. While the majority relied on the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, Justice Thomas said he would have ruled “the right to be free from excessive fines is one of the ‘privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States’ protected by the 14th Amendment.”…

That’s not quite right. The Bill of Rights originally only applied to the federal government, until after the civil war when the 14th amendment was passed. Since then the clause in that amendment saying no one can be deprived of life or liberty without due process has been interpreted to mean most of the bill of rights also applies to the states. This ruling said as much for the 8th amendment prohibitions on excessiv…

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#69

Post by TomMckenny »

>The court had, however, previously ruled that most protections under the Bill of Rights apply to the states

>...the Indiana Supreme Court ruled against Mr. Timbs, saying that the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of excessive fines did not apply to ones imposed by states.

Does anyone know which rights people assume they have but don't because the protection only applies on the federal level?

Re: U.S. Supreme Court Puts Limits on Police Power to Seize Private Property

#70

Post by zackmorris »

lostapathy wrote: post #42
qrbLPHiKpiux wrote: post #3

What is scary is that something like the Patriot Act can be signed in overnight and something like this will take decades.

The interesting thing, though, is that once a civil right is established and incorporated against the states, it's basically unassailable under our system. So while it takes a long time to get those rights properly enshrined, at least they seem to be safe.

That's generally true, although forces today are trying to dismantle the Bill of Rights to suit their own agendas:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/02/clarence-thomas-...

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