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62 lines
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62 lines
3.7 KiB
XML
<xml><p> Government Seizures Victimize Innocent
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By Andrew Schneider and Mary Pat Flaherty</p>
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<p>Part One: The Overview</p>
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<p>February 27, 1991. // Willie Jones, a second-generation nursery man in
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his family's Nashville business, bundles up money from last year's
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profits and heads off to buy flowers and shrubs in Houston. He makes
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this trip twice a year using cash, which the small growers prefer. //
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But this time, as he waits at the American Airlines gate in Nashville
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Metro Airport, he's flanked by two police officers who escort him into a
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small office, search him and seize the $9600 he's carrying. A ticket
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agent had alerted the officers that a large black man had paid for his
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ticket in bills, unusual these days. Because of the cash, and the fact
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that he fit a ``profile'' of what drug dealers supposedly look like,
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they believed he was buying or selling drugs. // He's free to go, he's
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told. But they keep his money -- his livelihood -- and give him a
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receipt in its place. // No evidence of wrongdoing was ever produced. No
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charges were ever filed. As far as anyone knows, Willie Jones neither
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uses drugs, nor buys or sells them. He is a gardening contractor who
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bought an airplane ticket. Who lost his hard-earned money to the cops.
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And can't get it back.
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That same day, an ocean away in Hawaii, federal drug agents arrive at
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the Maui home of retirees Joseph and Frances Lopes and claim it for the
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U.S. government. // For 49 years, Lopes worked on a sugar plantation,
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living in its camp housing before buying a modest home for himself, his
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wife, and their adult, mentally disturbed son, Thomas. // For a while,
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Thomas grew marijuana in the back yard -- and threatened to kill himself
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every time his parents tried to cut it down. In 1987, the police caught
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Thomas, then 28. He pleaded guilty, got probation for his first offense
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and was ordered to see a psychologist once a week. He has, and never
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again has grown dope or been arrested. The family thought this episode
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was behind them. // But earlier this year, a detective scouring old
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arrest records for forfeiture opportunities realized the Lopes house
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could be taken away because they had admitted they knew about the
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marijuana. // The police department stands to make a bundle. If the
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house is sold, the police get the proceeds.
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Jones and the Lopes family are among the thousands of Americans each
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year victimized by the federal seizure law -- a law meant to curb drugs
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by causing financial hardship to dealers. // A 10-month study by The
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Pittsburgh Press shows the law has run amok. In their zeal to curb drugs
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and sometimes fill their coffers with the proceeds of what they take,
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local cops, federal agents and the courts have curbed innocent
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Americans' civil rights. From Maine to Hawaii, people who are never
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charged with a crime had cars, boats, money and homes taken away. // In
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fact, 80 percent of the people who lost property to the federal
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government were never charged. And most of the seized items weren't the
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luxurious playthings of drug barons, but modest homes and simple cars
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and hard-earned savings of ordinary people. // But those goods generated
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$2 billion for the police departments that took them. // The owners'
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only crimes in many of these cases: They ``looked'' like drug dealers.
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They were black, Hispanic or flashily dressed. // Others, like the
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Lopeses, have been connected to a crime by circumstances beyond their
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control. // Says Eric Sterling, who helped write the law a decade ago as
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a lawyer on a congressional committee: ``The innocent-until-proven-</p>
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<p>--- Renegade v6-27 Beta</p>
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<p>Origin: Shark's Mouth 313-658-1110 750 MEGS Dual Amiga/IBM (23:313/108)
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</p></xml> |