I was watching Upworthy today. It’s a collection of video clips that are usually playing into all the appropriate high notice problems going on. Subjects such as Racism, Transgenderism, Terrorist Attacks, Sexual Equality are a few of the topics. So, when I saw one that dealt with “Civil Forfeiture” all I could think was…”What?”. Well, the clip is just over 16 minutes and I now consider it some of the best time I have ever spent online. I dare you to watch all 16 minutes of it and decide for yourself. OMG!
There you have it! I looked up the term for my home state of Indiana and … (drum roll)…in spite of how much fun we all (me included) often make of Indiana being behind the times and all of that, my state’s CF funds do NOT go to law enforcement. They get just enough to cover what was spent and then the rest goes into the state’s general fund or the educational fund. We won’t talk here about what I think of our educational system or the funding (although all of the CF monies must go to the general fund!). Here’s the line from Google:
Indiana has some of the better civil forfeiture laws in the country, at least with regard to the profit incentive. Unfortunately, to forfeit your property, the government only needs to show that it was more likely than not that your property was related to a crime and thus is forfeitable—the legal standard of preponderance of the evidence, lower than the beyond a reasonable doubt standard required for a criminal conviction. But law enforcement in Indiana does not receive any of the funds gained through civil forfeiture, which keeps the focus of law enforcement on preventing crime rather than raising funds. After deducting law enforcement costs for the prosecution of civil forfeitures, all forfeiture revenue is sent either to the general fund of the state or the state’s education fund. Indiana does participate in equitable sharing with the federal government, averaging more than $2.6 million per year in the 2000s.
*https://www.ij.org/asset-forfeiture-report-indiana
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Namaste,
Scott
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