Policing's Perverse Payoff

I read it first in the Washington Post: The nationwide confiscation of innocent motorists’ cash by police without warrants from drivers who have committed no crime. Hundreds of millions of dollars fleeced from unsuspecting Americans on mere speculation of a crime. “Stop and Seize” they call it. Read the outrageous five-part story here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/inve...

I don’t hate the police as others do. I believe most are hard-working, decent folk who want to keep public order and hope to foster a safe world in which they and their families can live at peace. The fact is, I am married to a retired law enforcement official. The practice of seizing assets from criminals, he tells me, is a reliable way to fund drug enforcement programs and provide equipment for local police departments.

But the stories I have read about innocent American drivers suffering theft at the hands of hundreds of law enforcement officers nationwide make me furious.

Stop and Seize goes way beyond the limits of historic forfeiture laws. It is naked highway robbery. It doesn’t pass the sniff test—it’s as stinky as the “public safety” argument foisted on the public for red-light cameras that do nothing but act as a cash pipeline for city governments. I ask you: Do you feel safer on the road when the driver in front of you slams on his or her brakes at a yellow light to avoid a red-light fine? OK, do you feel safer driving down the road knowing that a police officer can pull you over for a broken brake light and, on that pretense, confiscate all the cash in your purse or wallet? Does carrying a sizable amount of cash make you a criminal?

The outrage of Stop and Seize is that these innocent drivers never again see their money. Most are forced to hire (and pay for) an attorney to retrieve their illegally confiscated earnings, and even then, in nearly every case they retrieve only a fraction. See: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/na...

Identical to red-light cameras, Stop and Seize creates a perverse incentive for the police to pull you over in the first place. It’s payday for them, and only a very naïve person would believe that police aren’t influenced by the money to be grabbed. To wit: Here in Virginia, shortly after the City of Norfolk installed red-light cameras, the duration of the yellow-light cycle at intersections with red-light cameras inside city limits mysteriously lost 3/8 of a second, which had the spurious effect of causing significantly more drivers than ever to be slapped with red-light tickets. See:
http://wtkr.com/2014/03/13/newschanne...

Police are being trained on how to seize your cash in the course of a routine traffic stop. See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/investi...
It doesn’t take much to get your pocket picked: failure to signal for a turn, expired inspection sticker, failure to come to a full stop at a stop sign. All you have to do is look nervous (is anyone not nervous, even a little bit, when they see the flashing blue light in the rear view mirror?). Your nervousness, per police training, is justification to suspect a serious crime. Small infractions for you, big payola for them.

Know your rights. Don’t submit to a warrantless search. Don’t let a police officer detain you longer than he or she has to for a routine stop. And don’t get in your car with more cash than necessary to conduct your business for the day. It may be the last you see of it.