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How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

washingtonpost.com

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Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#81

Post by hinkley »

thedufer wrote: post #42
itistoday2 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am concerned that by calling it "civil forfeiture" this article is using language to mask a very basic crime. What was described in this article is called stealing or theft. To call it anything else is to mask and downplay what was done to this man. It is to enable the very act that was committed. George Carlin observed this as a dangerous trend in our language: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuEQixrBKCc Call it "…

Civil forfeiture isn't "soft language", it's a precise legal term. You may not agree with the principle (I certainly don't), but calling it theft is no different from a libertarian doing the same with taxation.

Are you saying you haven't noticed the systemic pattern of baking soft language into laws?

Have you not noticed the names they put on bills to get them through Congress (state or federal)? Right to Work? No Child Left Behind? DOMA, Internet Freedom Act. Hell, the Affordable Care Act (I SAID IT, sue me!)

These guys have it figured out, and when we figure it out they just change tactics. If they're that brazenly Orwellian on the title page how can they not be spending time softening the text in the middle?

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#82

Post by meric »

A DEA agent boarded the train at the Albuquerque Amtrak station and began asking various passengers, including Rivers, where they were going and why.

I wonder if the DEA agent followed him on the train after having found out the bank had reported a bunch of "suspicious" cash withdrawals and given up the victim's identity.

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#83

Post by sukilot »

Snap Judgment did a story this week about how the DEA will pressure child slave drug mules into becoming unpaid informants, and send them into large drug deals with armed cartel heavies, under threat of deportation, in exchange for fake promises of US citizenship.

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#85

Post by patcon »

itistoday2 wrote: post #46
thedufer wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Civil forfeiture isn't "soft language", it's a precise legal term. You may not agree with the principle (I certainly don't), but calling it theft is no different from a libertarian doing the same with taxation.

> Civil forfeiture isn't "soft language", it's a precise legal term. It is both. > calling it theft is no different from a libertarian doing the same with taxation. Taxation today is theft.

> Taxation today is theft.

You say "theft" like it's the typical "take" act that the word normally implies. It's more like someone stealing $200 and giving you a bicycle you didn't ask for, but you're likely still going to use it anyhow. ie. it's complicated, so it gets a new word :)

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#86

Post by itistoday2 »

rhino369 wrote: post #76
itistoday2 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In common usage, theft is the taking of another person's property without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. We are unable to give consent (consent implies choice), so it is theft through coercion (prison). See "group fund" for a voluntary form of taxation: http://groupcurrency.org

Guess who defines who the rightful owner of property is? Government.

> Guess who defines who the rightful owner of property is? Government.

A compelling argument. In that case this appears to be a non-story, and I'm not sure what the fuss is about.

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#87

Post by sukilot »

adventured wrote: post #54
andrewchambers wrote: post #22

It is amazing that Americans allow this sort of thing then say they are a world leader in personal liberty.

The scale of the civil forfeitures industry has increased drastically in the last 15 to 20 years. Most Americans are not yet aware of how large it has become, because it affects a relatively small percentage of people, and only in the last few years have the major news outlets begun to write about it (eg NY Times or Washington Post). When you have a country of 330 million people as large geographically as the US, it'…

Civil forfeiture abuse and DEA criminality has been in the news for over a decade. Though it may be getting more attention now.

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#88

Post by hinkley »

DigitalSea wrote: post #6

Civil forfeiture rules are disgusting. Sadly there are plenty of stories out there like this, people have lost their homes, cars and livelihoods because of these draconian laws around asset forfeiture. The circumstances under which your property can be taken are incredibly overreaching and unfair. There have been situations where people have had their homes taken away for ridiculous situations like this one: http://w…

I understand the claim that people with money could just use it all to buy a one way ticket to nowhere and never be seen again. But it seems to me that there's a very very wide line between "Use your money to keep doing bad things" and "We don't know if you're guilty but we're going to take all your money anyway and good luck with those legal costs"

Certainly putting all of their assets into escrow and only allowing access for approved uses (like say legal fees) would achieve the same results without pissing all over the sixth amendment.

Re: How the DEA took a young man’s life savings without charging him with a crime

#89

Post by itistoday2 »

patcon wrote: post #85
itistoday2 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Civil forfeiture isn't "soft language", it's a precise legal term. It is both. > calling it theft is no different from a libertarian doing the same with taxation. Taxation today is theft.

> Taxation today is theft. You say "theft" like it's the typical "take" act that the word normally implies. It's more like someone stealing $200 and giving you a bicycle you didn't ask for, but you're likely still going to use it anyhow. ie. it's complicated, so it gets a new word :)

> It's more like someone stealing $200

Sounds like we're in agreement then. :)

> and giving you a bicycle you didn't ask for

s/bicycle/war. No worries, I make that typo all the time. ;)

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