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POLICE IN ILLINOIS CAN
SEIZE YOUR PROPERTY WITHOUT CONVICTING YOU OF A CRIME
Illinois Policy Institute
Illinois
police have taken in a total of $72 million in seized property over the
past two years.
When Judy Wiese went to sleep Aug. 31, 2015, she was worried about her
grandson. He’d taken her car to work that day. And he was supposed to be
home that night.
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 Judy awoke at 1:30 a.m. to the sound of the telephone ringing. Police had
arrested her grandson for driving on a revoked license. And they had seized
Judy’s car in connection with the crime.
Judy hadn’t known about the revocation of her grandson’s license. And she didn’t
know what civil asset forfeiture was. But she was about to find out.
Her grandson was sentenced to 10 days in jail, but it would be five months until
she saw her car again. Five months of missing therapy appointments for her
broken arm. Five months of struggling to find rides to the grocery store. Five
months of anguish for a single, 70-year-old woman born and raised in Moline,
Ill.
“I’d never even had a traffic ticket,” she said.
Asset forfeiture laws were expanded across the country in the 1980s to whack
drug kingpins, enabling police to seize the fruits of their illicit labor. But
in Illinois, a broken system with perverse incentives is hitting up innocent
grandmothers, too.
Through civil asset forfeiture, Illinois police departments may take and keep
property they suspect is related to a crime. But they need not issue a warrant
or even bring any criminal charges to do so. The owner of the property must then
use his or her resources to prove in court the property wasn’t related to
criminal activity.
Innocent until proven guilty? Not in Illinois. Not for Judy. In civil asset
forfeiture cases, the burden of proof is dropped squarely on the shoulders of
the accused, not the accuser.
Living on $733 a month, Judy couldn’t afford a lawyer. And the worry of the case
was wearing on her. She was diagnosed with walking pneumonia.
“The doctor said it was the stress,” Judy said. “It was awful. I didn’t know
what to do.”
She tried to represent herself in court. It didn’t go well. She didn’t respond
correctly to the forfeiture complaint, and failed to get her response notarized.
But thankfully, a local reporter took an interest in her struggle. Rachel Warmke
published Judy’s story in The Dispatch in January.
Larry Vandersnick, a former Henry County state’s attorney, saw the story and
offered to represent Judy pro bono. He quickly reached a settlement with the
Rock Island County state’s attorney. Judy had her car back in a matter of days.
“I was so excited,” she said. “It was like getting a new car.”
[to top of second column] |
 Vandersnick believes the state’s forfeiture
laws are ripe for reform.
“There’s so many cases that people can’t contest,” Vandersnick said.
“The burden of proof needs to be on the prosecutor. It’s
quasi-criminal, if not criminal, to take someone’s property from
them in this way.”
One of the most concerning aspects of civil asset forfeiture in
Illinois is that residents don’t know how prevalent the practice is.
That’s because police departments don’t distinguish between criminal
and civil asset forfeiture. Criminal asset forfeiture happens after
a conviction has been secured against a criminal.
Records obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union’s Illinois
chapter show Illinois police have taken in a total of $72 million in
seized property over the past two years, through civil and criminal
asset forfeiture.
Police agencies in Illinois are allowed to keep 90 percent of the
proceeds from the sales of seized property. No matter how much
integrity a department has, many people say this “policing for
profit” model is cause for concern.
“Many departments try to make it look like it’s policy driven,” said
south suburban police sergeant Glenn Nixon. “The reality is that
it’s a revenue generator.”
In 2010, former Grant Park Chief of Police Scott Fitts was sentenced
to 63 months in federal prison for an elaborate scheme involving
civil asset forfeiture. The disgraced police chief accepted bribe
money from nearly 100 individuals in exchange for dropping their
charges and keeping the cash he seized from them through civil asset
forfeiture.
The system should have been reformed after such a large scandal. But
it wasn’t.
When it comes to forfeiture cases, Illinois received a D- from the
Institute for Justice for the quality of its protections for
property owners.
Many states have taken steps to reform their civil asset forfeiture
laws. Most recently, on April 19, Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts signed
a bill to banish civil asset forfeiture from the Cornhusker State.
Michigan, Minnesota and New Mexico have all recently reformed civil
asset forfeiture as well.
Illinois should follow suit.
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