Police Union Defends Forfeiture By Saying Anyone Carrying A Bunch Of Cash Is Probably A Criminal
Archived version: https://archive.ph/JX1HX
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20240106131240/https://www.techdirt.com/2024/01/05/police-union-defends-forfeiture-by-saying-anyone-carrying-a-bunch-of-cash-is-probably-a-criminal/
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13 replies
Police are criminals.
Statistically, someone carrying a badge is more likely to be a criminal than someone carrying money.
Do you have a source for that, because i'd love to be able to use it.
I don't know how or why asset forfiture was ever allowed, moral, or legal but it should have been outlawed a very long time ago.
Legalized thievery is worse than actual theft. It is corrupt and morally bankrupt.
After "seizing" a bunch of cash, the police are carrying a bunch of cash. Statement checks out.
Yet if you're not carrying any you're a criminal vagrant, so you're screwed either way
I know everyone likes to hate on cryptocurrency, but I think there is something beautiful about cash you can carry entirely in a series of words you've memorized that no one can prove you even have.
Unless you use something like Monero it's still useless since blockchain is neither anonymous, not private and since all exchanges requires KYC (Know Your Customer), your identity will be tied to that money.
So just do that? I don't get this argument that lack of anonymity is a fatal flaw when various effective anonymizing solutions exist.
But anyway that talking point isn't even relevant in this circumstance. It doesn't matter if it is possible in theory for someone with access to exchange records to uncover a link between you and your crypto holdings. Cops looking to mug you at a traffic stop or the airport are not going to find it practical to do that, and even if they did they have no way to take it from you simply because it isn't a physical object. It's an objective fact that cryptocurrency is massively more resistant to civil forfeiture than physical cash.
It's only not a flaw if people do take those extra steps. By default, it's not anonymous and that is an important caveat.
As is a bank account if that's the threat model. Everything is relative to a threat model you want to protect from.
I see this as being about control as much as threat model. Using a bank as a defense against civil forfeiture is exactly what these cops are calling people criminals for not doing.
I agree with you there.
https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/249850.pdf