Repeater
Regular Member
Bart Hinkle seems to like it:
Side effects may include seizures
The bill's language looks pretty good for a first step, but I think it needs work.
For one thing, I would like to see a mandate that if law enforcement damages, destroys, or loses illegally seized personal property, they shall be liable for damages.
And I have to be concerned when gun-hating Sheriff Jett is involved. No doubt his interests are incompatible with ours on this topic.
Side effects may include seizures
It probably seemed like a bright idea at the time: Let the police seize the ill-gotten gains of alleged drug dealers and other suspected criminals and sell it, using the proceeds to buy much-needed crime-fighting gear.
Unfortunately, the process — civil asset forfeiture — did not require convicting anybody of a crime. In fact, it didn’t even require charging anybody with a crime. Not surprisingly, this led to rampant abuse, which has been abundantly documented for many years.
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But Virginia lawmaker Mark Cole is going to give it another shot. That’s as good a sign as any that civil asset forfeiture has jumped the shark.
You can’t get much more conservative than Cole, a Republican who represents Spotsylvania in the General Assembly, without falling off the edge of the political spectrum.
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On his website, Cole boasts of supporting law enforcement. “Public safety and emergency services are Mark Cole’s top priorities,” reads a quote from Stafford County Sheriff Charlie Jett. “He helped ensure that funding was available for pay raises for deputies and state troopers. He has been a strong voice for us in Richmond.”
But policing for profit has gone too far, even for Cole. In anticipation of the 2015 legislative session, he already has filed a bill (HB 1287) that would forbid asset forfeiture without a conviction — and even then only after all appeals have been exhausted.
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Taking property from people who haven’t been charged with any crime is “fundamentally un-American,” Cole told the online news organ Watchdog.org.
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Cole says he has heard from some commonwealth’s attorneys who think his bill would make their job harder.
The bill's language looks pretty good for a first step, but I think it needs work.
For one thing, I would like to see a mandate that if law enforcement damages, destroys, or loses illegally seized personal property, they shall be liable for damages.
And I have to be concerned when gun-hating Sheriff Jett is involved. No doubt his interests are incompatible with ours on this topic.