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

nytimes.com

241–250 of 457 posts

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

#241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a welcome check on the Executive and Legislative branches. Anyone can become President, and anyone can become a lawmaker. It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench.

Minus the odd occasion of sexual assault [1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brett_Kavanaugh#Sexual_assault...

[deleted]

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

#242

The important thing to understand about this case is the background and what the SCotUS actually ruled on. It's actually rather narrow ruling even if it is extremely important. The court exercised judicial restraint here, and made the minimum ruling necessary. Timbs was convicted of possession/sale/whatever, jailed for a year, and fined $1,200. The state confiscated his Range Rover as well. Timbs sued or appealed the…

You are correct that they didn't rule on it. But they did write an opinion that was highly suggestive of what the particular finding in this case should have been. It doesn't carry the weight of law, but it isn't nothing, either.

It does, in fact, carry the weight of law (not just in the instant case but in every case to which it's ruling is applicable in every US federal and state court at every level, other than the US Supreme Court itself.)

It isn't, on its own, a final judgment on the case, but that doesn't mean it lacks force of law.

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

#243

The important thing to understand about this case is the background and what the SCotUS actually ruled on. It's actually rather narrow ruling even if it is extremely important. The court exercised judicial restraint here, and made the minimum ruling necessary. Timbs was convicted of possession/sale/whatever, jailed for a year, and fined $1,200. The state confiscated his Range Rover as well. Timbs sued or appealed the…

> Timbs sued or appealed the confiscation by Indiana, which he he could prove he didn't buy with drug money. Shouldn't the burden of proof of financing lie with the state before property possession is carried out? It is unfair for the defendant to prove the source of funds for his own property

This is why evil will always win, because good is dumb.

Or more precisely, evil people will happily violate entire tranches of law while the good people are stuck prosecuting one case at a time, painfully establishing precedent by precedent, and in the meantime the world has moved on.

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

#244

The important thing to understand about this case is the background and what the SCotUS actually ruled on. It's actually rather narrow ruling even if it is extremely important. The court exercised judicial restraint here, and made the minimum ruling necessary. Timbs was convicted of possession/sale/whatever, jailed for a year, and fined $1,200. The state confiscated his Range Rover as well. Timbs sued or appealed the…

> Timbs sued or appealed the confiscation by Indiana, which he he could prove he didn't buy with drug money. Shouldn't the burden of proof of financing lie with the state before property possession is carried out? It is unfair for the defendant to prove the source of funds for his own property

People have been saying that stuff for years. Unfortunately, this affects mostly folks doing illegal things or those accused of them, making the public at large have little incentive to fix it.

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

#245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a welcome check on the Executive and Legislative branches. Anyone can become President, and anyone can become a lawmaker. It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench.

> It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench. No, it just takes the support of the President and a sufficient number of Senators. Of which, by your own argument, anyone can become either; there is either more of a filter than you’d like to pretend on the political branches, or less than you’d like to pretend on the judiciary.

>> It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench.

> No, it just takes the support of the President and a sufficient number of Senators.

You're kinda both right. The legal mechanism says that "a lifetime of respect" isn't necessary, but the norms that have evolved around its use say otherwise.

Recent history demonstrates (in the extreme) that norms aren't inviolable, but I think the ones around the competency of Supreme Court confirmees is stronger than most.

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

#246
post #16

Hmm I wonder how this will affect the other civil forfeiture practice of charging the item itself with the crime (eg: "United States v. $124,700 in U.S. Currency" [0]) where the owner of the property is never actually charged with a crime. Maybe this will stop that because without a conviction any fine could be considered excessive? The logic behind these cases has always baffled me. How do courts get around due proc…

This specific case was taken and argued by the Institute for Justice ( https://ij.org ), a civil liberties legal charity, that has a goal of addressing exactly this problem. The original civil forfeiture practices were put in place at the height of "the war on drugs" in the 80's as I recall. The rationale was you had drug dealer types that were successfully evading prosecution on the tougher criminal standards of pro…

> The original civil forfeiture practices were put in place at the height of "the war on drugs" in the 80's as I recall.

No, they were in admiralty/customs law and predate the US, but came along with the body of law the US kept at it's founding.

There was some new activity around Prohibition.

Then big activity starting in 1970 around the drug war.

(That's for federal civil forfeiture, while state level civil forfeiture has the same pre-US history, the later evolution varies by state.)

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

#247
post #161
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Justice Thomas has been fighting a long battle trying to restore the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the 14th amendment after it was effectively removed from the constitution in the Slaughter-House Cases. He'll often issue dissents or concurrences just to raise the issue of the Privileges or Immunities Clause. The Institute For Justice (who argued this case, somewhat coincidentally) has a podcast about the 14th Am…

Background on the Slaughterhouse Cases: https://www.thirteen.org/wnet/supremecourt/antebellum/landma...

Thomas would quite happily overturn this line of reasoning just to get the government back to the business of just enforcing contracts. I'm sure he'd be happy to let workers sign themselves into slavery again. Daniel Webster must be applauding from his grave.

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

#248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not this case, in which police abused their power to pick on a citizen?

Perhaps because it's a citizen who was able to afford the expensive car by profiting off of something illegal?

That is not correct. He purchased it with the proceeds of his father's life insurance policy.

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

#249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench. No, it just takes the support of the President and a sufficient number of Senators. Of which, by your own argument, anyone can become either; there is either more of a filter than you’d like to pretend on the political branches, or less than you’d like to pretend on the judiciary.

>> It takes a lifetime of respect to earn a seat on the Supreme Court bench. > No, it just takes the support of the President and a sufficient number of Senators. You're kinda both right. The legal mechanism says that "a lifetime of respect" isn't necessary, but the norms that have evolved around its use say otherwise. Recent history demonstrates (in the extreme) that norms aren't inviolable, but I think the ones aro…

That's because, by and large, it also takes considerable respect in practice to become a President or Senator (sure, you can find a few exceptions, but you can for the Supreme Court, too, and there have been a lot fewer Supreme Court justices than Senators and Presidents combined.)

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

#250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For reference, in forma pauperis means "in the shape of a poor man"; pockets aren't mentioned. As far as I'm aware, the Romans didn't have pockets and so there would be no way to express the concept in Latin.

Latin was the international language of Europe for almost a thousand years after the collapse of the Roman Empire, during which time many scientific advancements were made. There are plenty of Latin words for things that didn't exist in Antiquity.

There are tiny communities who use recreational Latin today. Here's the Vicipaedia article on the telephonum: https://la.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephonum

But that doesn't really constitute a good argument that there is a Latin word for telephones.

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