Pubdate: Sun, 29 Nov 2015 Source: Denver Post (CO) Copyright: 2015 The Denver Post Corp Contact: http://www.denverpost.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122 Author: Diana Simpson Note: Diana Simpson, a Littleton native, is an attorney at the Washington-based Institute for Justice. ABOLISH CIVIL FORFEITURE Can law enforcement take and keep your cash, car, home, or other property regardless of your guilt or innocence? The surprising answer is "yes" under the practice known as civil forfeiture. Every year, police and prosecutors around the country take more property from people without so much as charging them with a crime. According to the Institute for Justice's new national report card, Colorado is no exception, earning a C for its forfeiture laws. Though Colorado reformed its laws in 2002, it still has a long way to go to protect property rights. Currently, law enforcement need not obtain a conviction in criminal court as a prerequisite to forfeiting property in civil court. Rather, it can legally forfeit someone's property if it provides "clear and convincing evidence" - well short of the "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard for criminal convictions. Even worse, Colorado law enforcement agencies have a direct financial incentive in the property they seize: Fifty percent of civil forfeiture proceeds go straight to law enforcement. (The other half is supposed to fund drug-treatment programs.) The more cash and property law enforcement forfeit, the more money it receives. It is, quite literally, policing for profit. Obtaining a true picture of Colorado's forfeiture practices can be arduous. Though agencies are required to file reports detailing their forfeitures, many are inexplicably absent from the state's database. But the state's forfeiture laws are not the only problem. Participating in federal "equitable sharing" allows state and local law enforcement to team up with the federal government to forfeit property under federal law. That gives state and local law enforcement up to 80 percent of the proceeds, dramatically higher than the 50 percent Colorado law awards. It should come as no surprise that Colorado law enforcement routinely turns to equitable sharing. In fact, only 16 states use equitable sharing more aggressively than Colorado. From 2000 to 2013, Colorado law enforcement's use of the U.S. Department of Justice's equitable sharing program netted nearly $48 million - an annual average of $3.4 million. By comparison, Colorado agencies generated $12.7 million during that same period under the state's forfeiture laws, suggesting circumvention is rampant. Equitable sharing abuse is a growing, national problem: Proceeds from the Department of Justice (DOJ) program more than tripled between 2000 and 2013. One investigation by The Washington Post found nearly 62,000 cash seizures since 9/11 from people who were never charged with a crime. Almost 1,000 of these seizures came from Colorado alone. In response to growing outrage about equitable sharing, the DOJ announced a new policy in January intended to curb its use. But the policy largely left intact seizures by joint task forces and investigations involving federal law enforcement, which generated a whopping 82 percent of Colorado's equitable sharing proceeds, according to the Institute for Justice analysis. In other words, the Justice Department's decision is unlikely to significantly hinder equitable sharing in Colorado. Congress was expected to advance federal reform this year that would abolish equitable sharing, but has so far failed to do so. As long as state and federal laws fail to protect property owners and give law enforcement a financial incentive to take property, civil forfeiture will continue to grow. Forfeiture should never happen absent a criminal conviction, and law enforcement should not be incentivized to forfeit property. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom