WEBVTT

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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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Perhaps a nice mountain
bike for 3,000 dollars.

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At that price,

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it's probably one of those bikes
with a little electric motor on it --

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(Laughter)

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maybe some streamers from the handle bars.

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(Laughter)

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The sellers declared
this a "cash only" deal,

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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,

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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 ...

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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.

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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

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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,

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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,

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and then later, other types of crime.

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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,

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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,

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

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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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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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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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that can distort law enforcement.

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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,

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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,

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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

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down the street from their house.

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40 dollars.

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The police watched the deal go down.

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

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but they didn't.

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They could've arrested the Sourovelis' son
right there on the street

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and grabbed 40 dollars ...

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but they didn't.

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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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the "City that loves you back" --

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(Laughter)

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that Philadelphia was running
a forfeiture machine.

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Between 2002 and 2016

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Philadelphia took more than 77 million
dollars through forfeiture,

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including 1200 homes.

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Cars, jewelry, electronics --

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all of it they sold,

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the proceeds they kept,

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and they would've kept right on doing it

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had it not been
for a class-action lawsuit --

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our team's class-action lawsuit --

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(Applause and cheers)

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Thank you.

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We forced them to change
their forfeiture practices

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and to compensate victims.

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(Applause and cheers)

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When our team first began
researching forfeiture in 2007,

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we had no idea how much
forfeiture revenue there was.

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In fact, no one knew.

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It wasn't until our groundbreaking study,

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"Policing for Profit"

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that we found federal law
enforcement agencies have taken in

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almost 40 billion dollars --

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billion with a b --

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since 2001.

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More than 80 percent of that
through civil forfeiture.

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Unfortunately we have no idea

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how much state and local
agencies have taken in

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because in many states,

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they don't have to report it.

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So until we reform forfeiture,

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we'll never know how much
forfeiture activity actually occurs

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in the United States.

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And we desperately need reform.

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Legislatures should
abolish civil forfeiture

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and replace it with criminal forfeiture.

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And all forfeiture proceeds
should go to neutral fund

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such as a general fund.

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When forfeiture proceeds stop hitting
law enforcement budgets directly,

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that is when we will end
policing for profit.

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(Applause)

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Now as you can imagine,

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law enforcement officials
don't love these recommendations.

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(Laughter)

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They stand to lose a lot of money,

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and they believe civil forfeiture
is an effective crime-fighting tool.

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The trouble is, it's not.

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In June 2019, we released a study

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that found forfeiture does not
improve crime-fighting.

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And the report also found
that law enforcement agencies pursue

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more forfeiture money
during economic downturns.

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So when city and county budgets are tight,

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law enforcement will use
forfeiture to find the money.

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So it's no wonder then

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that law enforcement officials
predict a "criminal apocolypse" --

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(Laughter)

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if these reforms are adopted.

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But some states have
already implemented them,

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and we're pushing for reform
all across the country

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because until we reform forfeiture,

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this is something that could
happen to any of us.

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It can happen in the United States,

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it can happen in the United Kingdom,

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it can happen in countries
throughout the European Union

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and beyond.

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People like you and me

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and the Sourvellis'

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and Russ Caswell,

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just doing the everyday stuff of life,

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can be caught in a scheme
we never thought possible.

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It is time we end policing for profit

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once and for all.

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Thank you.

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(Applause and cheers)