Supreme Court Reins in State Power to Seize Property and Collect Fines
20th February 2019
The Supreme Court reigned in state power to seize property and levy fines for criminal offenses Wednesday, unanimously ruling that the Eighth Amendment ban on excessive fines applies to the states.
Civil libertarians expect the ruling will curtail asset forfeitures at the state and local levels, a much-criticized practice through which law enforcement seizes property connected to the commission of a crime. Critics say such seizures are often disproportionate to the criminal offense at issue.
This is a huge win. The ‘war on drugs’ had spawned the pretext of Civil Asset Forfeiture whereby those who were suspected of breaking the law but who could not be prosecuted for lack of evidence would be impoverished by having their assets stripped from them on very specious grounds. Local governments have been using this as a honeypot to pad out their budgets by effectively stealing from people who they temporarily had at their mercy but who were not under the protective umbrella of the politically powerful or well-connected.