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Picture yourself driving
down the road tomorrow,

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heading somewhere to buy
an item you found on Craigslist.

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00:00:09,044 --> 00:00:12,389
Perhaps a nice mountain
bike for 3,000 dollars.

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00:00:13,332 --> 00:00:14,355
At that price,

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00:00:14,355 --> 00:00:17,707
it's probably one of those bikes
with a little electric motor on it --

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00:00:17,707 --> 00:00:18,714
(Laughter)

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maybe some streamers from the handle bars.

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00:00:20,806 --> 00:00:21,809
(Laughter)

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The sellers declared
this a "cash only" deal,

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00:00:25,084 --> 00:00:29,425
so you have, in the console
of your car, 3,000 dollars.

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Suddenly you are pulled over.

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During the stop the officer asks,

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"Do you have any drugs, weapons
or large amounts of cash in your car?"

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You truthfully answer, "yes,"

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not to the drugs or to the weapons,

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but to the cash.

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In the blink of an eye,

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you are ordered out of your car.

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The officer searches
it and finds your cash.

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On the spot, he seizes it and he says
he suspects it's part of a drug crime.

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A few days later,

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the local district attorney files
paperwork to keep your money ...

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permanently.

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And all of this happens

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without you ever being charged
or convicted of any crime.

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Now you might be saying,

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"Ach, this would never
happen in the United States."

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(Laughter)

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Incidents like this occur
every day in our country.

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It's one of the most significant
threats to your property rights

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most people have never even heard of.

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It's called civil forfeiture.

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Most of you are generally aware
of criminal forfeiture,

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although the term itself
might be a little unfamiliar,

35
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so let's begin with forfeiture.

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When we forfeit something
we give up that thing

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or we're forced to give it up.

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In criminal forfeiture,

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someone is charged
and convicted of a crime

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and therefore they have to give up
property related to that crime.

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For example, suppose you use your car
to transport and deal drugs.

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You're caught and convicted;

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now you have to give up
or forfeit your car

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as part of the sentencing.

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That's criminal forfeiture.

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But in civil forfeiture,

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no person is charged with a crime ...

48
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the property is charged
and convicted of a crime.

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(Murmuring)

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You heard that correctly.

51
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The government actually convicts
an inanimate object with a crime.

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It's as if that thing itself
committed the crime.

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That's why civil forfeiture cases
have these really peculiar names

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like "The United States of America
v. One 1990 Ford Thunderbird."

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(Laughter)

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Or "The State of Oklahoma
v. 53,234 Dollars Cash."

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(Laughter)

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Or my personal favorite:

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"The United States of America
v. One Solid Gold Object

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in the Form of a Rooster."

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(Laughter)

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Now you're thinking:

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how does something like this happen?

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That's exactly what I said

65
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when I first learned
about civil forfeiture

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while one a road trip with my wife.

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No, we did not get pulled over --

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(Laughter)

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I was reading about the history
of civil forfeiture

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as part of my work as a research
director at the law firm,

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and I came across one of the cases
I just mentioned,

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"The United States of America
v. One 1990 Ford Thunderbird."

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In that case, Carol Thomas
loaned her car to her son.

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While in the car, her son committed
a minor drug crime.

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Carol didn't commit any crime,

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so law enforcement couldn't
convict her and take the car,

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but they could --

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and did --

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use civil forfeiture
to "convict the car" and take it.

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Carol was completely innocent
but she lost her car nonetheless.

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In other words,

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she was punished for a crime
she did not commit.

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When I read this I was gobsmacked.

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How could this occur?

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How is this even legal?

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It turns out it began in our country
with maritime law.

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Early in our republic, the government
sought to fight piracy --

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yes, actual pirates.

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The problem was the government
often couldn't catch the pirates,

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so instead it used civil forfeiture
to convict the pirates' property

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and take it,

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and therefore deny the pirates
their illegal profits.

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Of course, the government
could've simply taken and kept the booty

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without necessarily
using civil forfeiture,

95
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but doing so would've violated

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our most basic due process
and property rights.

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Now the government rarely used
civil forfeiture until the 1980s

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and the war on drugs.

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We expanded civil forfeiture law
to cover drug crimes,

100
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and then later, other types of crime.

101
00:05:05,486 --> 00:05:09,238
Canada and the European Union
adopted similar provisions

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so that now all kinds of people
are ensnared in the forfeiture web.

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People like Russ Caswell.

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Russ Caswell owned a small,
budget motel in Tewksbury, Massachusetts.

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His father built the motel in 1955
and Russ took it over in the 1980s.

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During the years that Russ
owned the motel,

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from time to time,

108
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people would rent rooms
and they would commit drug crimes.

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Russ didn't condone the activities --

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in fact, whenever he found out about it,
he would immediately call police.

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Russ was entirely innocent of any crime,

112
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but that did not stop the US Department
of Justice from seizing his motel

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00:05:51,880 --> 00:05:55,261
simply because other people
committed crimes there.

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But Russ' case was not alone.

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Between 1997 and 2016,

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00:06:02,380 --> 00:06:08,660
the US Department of Justice
took more than 635,000 properties.

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This means each year,

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tens of thousands of people
lose their properties

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in cases in which they're never charged
of convicted of any crime.

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And we're not talking about --

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not necessarily talking about
major drug kingpins

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or headline-grabbing financial fraudsters

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00:06:25,389 --> 00:06:29,212
whose cases involve hundreds
of thousands if not millions of dollars.

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Many of these seizures and forfeitures
involve just everyday people

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like Russ Caswell,

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or you,

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or me.

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But it gets worse.

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Are you wondering,

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where does all this cash
and property end up?

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In most places, law enforcement keeps it.

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And they use it to buy equipment,

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or pay for building repairs,

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or even pay salaries and overtime.

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This is a clear conflict of interest.

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It creates a perverse profit incentive

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00:07:02,493 --> 00:07:05,062
that can distort law enforcement.

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00:07:05,543 --> 00:07:09,295
And this is a problem that's not lost
on those in law enforcement either.

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Former chief of police
in Rochester, Minnesota,

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Roger Peterson,

141
00:07:12,991 --> 00:07:16,305
described the choice
that police officers often face.

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As he described it,

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suppose I'm a police officer
and I see a drug deal.

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Now I face a choice:

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do I go after the buyer

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and remove from the street illegal drugs,

147
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or do I go after the seller

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and get cash for my agency to use?

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So it's easy to see why
a police officer might go for the cash.

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It was just such a circumstance

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that compelled police officers
in Philadelphia

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to seize an entire house.

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In 2014, Chris and Markela Sourovelis' son

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sold 40 dollars worth of drugs

155
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down the street from their house.

156
00:08:01,264 --> 00:08:03,900
40 dollars.

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00:08:05,150 --> 00:08:07,460
The police watched the deal go down.

158
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They could've arrested the buyer
and confiscated the drugs ...

159
00:08:11,815 --> 00:08:13,201
but they didn't.

160
00:08:13,978 --> 00:08:17,695
They could've arrested the Sourovelis' son
right there on the street

161
00:08:17,695 --> 00:08:20,136
and grabbed 40 dollars ...

162
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but they didn't.

163
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They waited to arrest him at home

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because then they could seize
their entire house.

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The house was worth 350,000 dollars.

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That is what I mean
by a perverse profit incentive.

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But the Sourovelis' case was no outlier.

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Philadelphia, the "City
of Brotherly Love,"

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the "Athens of America,"

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the "cradle of liberty,"

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birthplace to the Constitution,

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home to the Liberty Bell
and Independence Hall,

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00:08:51,714 --> 00:08:53,764
the "City that loves you back" --

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00:08:53,764 --> 00:08:55,752
(Laughter)

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00:08:55,752 --> 00:09:00,465
that Philadelphia was running
a forfeiture machine.

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00:09:01,423 --> 00:09:04,832
Between 2002 and 2016

177
00:09:04,832 --> 00:09:10,531
Philadelphia took more than 77 million
dollars through forfeiture,

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00:09:10,531 --> 00:09:14,232
including 1200 homes.

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00:09:15,146 --> 00:09:17,399
Cars, jewelry, electronics --

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00:09:17,399 --> 00:09:18,698
all of it they sold,

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00:09:18,698 --> 00:09:19,983
the proceeds they kept,

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00:09:19,983 --> 00:09:22,083
and they would've kept right on doing it

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00:09:22,083 --> 00:09:24,465
had it not been
for a class-action lawsuit --

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00:09:24,465 --> 00:09:26,890
our team's class-action lawsuit --

185
00:09:26,890 --> 00:09:33,088
(Applause and cheers)

186
00:09:35,538 --> 00:09:36,855
Thank you.

187
00:09:36,855 --> 00:09:39,478
We forced them to change
their forfeiture practices

188
00:09:39,478 --> 00:09:41,659
and to compensate victims.

189
00:09:42,483 --> 00:09:47,081
(Applause and cheers)

190
00:09:47,832 --> 00:09:51,744
When our team first began
researching forfeiture in 2007,

191
00:09:51,744 --> 00:09:55,244
we had no idea how much
forfeiture revenue there was.

192
00:09:55,244 --> 00:09:56,623
In fact, no one knew.

193
00:09:57,182 --> 00:09:59,586
It wasn't until our groundbreaking study,

194
00:09:59,586 --> 00:10:01,302
"Policing for Profit"

195
00:10:01,302 --> 00:10:05,242
that we found federal law
enforcement agencies have taken in

196
00:10:05,242 --> 00:10:08,570
almost 40 billion dollars --

197
00:10:08,570 --> 00:10:10,509
billion with a b --

198
00:10:10,509 --> 00:10:12,342
since 2001.

199
00:10:13,111 --> 00:10:16,850
More than 80 percent of that
through civil forfeiture.

200
00:10:17,932 --> 00:10:20,028
Unfortunately we have no idea

201
00:10:20,028 --> 00:10:22,262
how much state and local
agencies have taken in

202
00:10:22,262 --> 00:10:23,854
because in many states,

203
00:10:23,854 --> 00:10:25,769
they don't have to report it.

204
00:10:26,641 --> 00:10:29,014
So until we reform forfeiture,

205
00:10:29,014 --> 00:10:32,334
we'll never know how much
forfeiture activity actually occurs

206
00:10:32,334 --> 00:10:33,854
in the United States.

207
00:10:33,854 --> 00:10:36,819
And we desperately need reform.

208
00:10:37,540 --> 00:10:40,983
Legislatures should
abolish civil forfeiture

209
00:10:40,983 --> 00:10:43,814
and replace it with criminal forfeiture.

210
00:10:43,814 --> 00:10:47,316
And all forfeiture proceeds
should go to neutral fund

211
00:10:47,316 --> 00:10:49,467
such as a general fund.

212
00:10:49,773 --> 00:10:53,835
When forfeiture proceeds stop hitting
law enforcement budgets directly,

213
00:10:53,835 --> 00:10:57,176
that is when we will end
policing for profit.

214
00:10:58,479 --> 00:11:03,628
(Applause)

215
00:11:05,056 --> 00:11:08,243
Now as you can imagine,

216
00:11:08,243 --> 00:11:11,890
law enforcement officials
don't love these recommendations.

217
00:11:11,946 --> 00:11:13,214
(Laughter)

218
00:11:13,430 --> 00:11:15,901
They stand to lose a lot of money,

219
00:11:15,901 --> 00:11:20,615
and they believe civil forfeiture
is an effective crime-fighting tool.

220
00:11:21,334 --> 00:11:23,935
The trouble is, it's not.

221
00:11:24,765 --> 00:11:27,341
In June 2019, we released a study

222
00:11:27,341 --> 00:11:31,367
that found forfeiture does not
improve crime-fighting.

223
00:11:31,985 --> 00:11:36,133
And the report also found
that law enforcement agencies pursue

224
00:11:36,133 --> 00:11:39,295
more forfeiture money
during economic downturns.

225
00:11:40,094 --> 00:11:43,275
So when city and county budgets are tight,

226
00:11:43,275 --> 00:11:46,698
law enforcement will use
forfeiture to find the money.

227
00:11:46,949 --> 00:11:48,793
So it's no wonder then

228
00:11:48,793 --> 00:11:53,395
that law enforcement officials
predict a "criminal apocolypse" --

229
00:11:53,395 --> 00:11:54,398
(Laughter)

230
00:11:54,398 --> 00:11:56,377
if these reforms are adopted.

231
00:11:57,197 --> 00:11:59,543
But some states have
already implemented them,

232
00:11:59,543 --> 00:12:02,194
and we're pushing for reform
all across the country

233
00:12:02,194 --> 00:12:06,071
because until we reform forfeiture,

234
00:12:06,071 --> 00:12:08,647
this is something that could
happen to any of us.

235
00:12:08,647 --> 00:12:10,763
It can happen in the United States,

236
00:12:10,763 --> 00:12:12,902
it can happen in the United Kingdom,

237
00:12:12,902 --> 00:12:15,878
it can happen in countries
throughout the European Union

238
00:12:15,878 --> 00:12:17,178
and beyond.

239
00:12:17,529 --> 00:12:19,144
People like you and me

240
00:12:19,144 --> 00:12:20,094
and the Sourvellis'

241
00:12:20,094 --> 00:12:21,229
and Russ Caswell,

242
00:12:21,229 --> 00:12:24,614
just doing the everyday stuff of life,

243
00:12:24,614 --> 00:12:28,463
can be caught in a scheme
we never thought possible.

244
00:12:28,796 --> 00:12:32,768
It is time we end policing for profit

245
00:12:32,768 --> 00:12:34,863
once and for all.

246
00:12:34,863 --> 00:12:36,223
Thank you.

247
00:12:36,223 --> 00:12:39,855
(Applause and cheers)