Private property rights, due process and the concept of innocent until proven guilty are bedrock principles enshrined in America’s founding and in its legal system. This week, Gov. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., signed a law that will fortify those principles.
It will curtail civil asset forfeiture, which has allowed police to seize and keep property they claim to believe has been involved in the commission of a crime, even when no one is convicted and no charges are even filed.
The reform requires police and prosecutors to secure a conviction before pursuing forfeiture. It also requires more rigorous reporting, and limits the circumstances under which “equitable sharing” may be applied.
“Equitable sharing” is the Orwellian locution used to describe a Justice Department program that allows state and local agencies to join hands with the feds to bypass state restrictions against forfeiture. The program has, for obvious reasons, created incentives for grotesque abuse. In Nebraska alone, tens of millions of dollars worth of cash and property have been collected through forfeiture between 2000 and 2013. Much of it was used to pad local police budgets.
The new law also makes it easier for innocent property owners to recover legal fees. And it forces most agencies to give at least a quarter of their proceeds to social programs, so asset seizure involves at least a reduced, if not an eliminated conflict of interest.
Reformers have the Constitution and public opinion on their side. Most people don’t know about civil asset forfeiture, but when they understand it, they dislike it. Tales of egregious behavior by law enforcement are legion.
Here are a few. A pastor had $14,000 seized at a traffic stop; a decorated Air Force veteran forfeited $63,000 in savings though he was never even charged with a crime; a convenience store owner had his entire $150,000 savings account drained merely for being accused of breaking obscure banking laws. In a recent HuffPost/YouGov survey, 71 percent agreed that law officers shouldn’t be allowed to take property permanently unless the owner was convicted of a crime.
In February, the Washington Examiner called civil asset forfeiture “scantily camouflaged extortion [that] cries out for reform.” Indeed, 35 states earned a D+ rating or worse for their civil asset forfeiture laws in a recent Institute for Justice report.
We listed the types of reforms we’d like to see, including those that raise the burden of proof for forfeiture and eliminate incentives for abuse by ensuring that forfeiture proceeds go to states’ general funds rather than local police departments.
Many states that have reformed their civil asset forfeiture laws have something in common; they are run by Republicans. Nebraska’s law was passed by a Republican legislature and signed by its Republican governor. It was the same in Florida, New Mexico, Wyoming and Michigan.
Property rights are central to conservative thought and undergird the American idea of liberty. That’s why, for example, conservatives understand that confiscatory taxes are morally repugnant, not just managerially incompetent.
Nebraska’s lawmakers have stood for conservative principles of fairness, freedom and justice. Conservatives are leading the way in reforming the broken criminal justice system.
