Philadelphia authorities enjoy robbing its innocent citizens and spending the money on fancy stuff for their own use.

"Taken" is a blood-boiling, beautifully written expose on America's "civil forfeiture" laws by which people who are tangentially related to suspected drug offenses have their assets seized, even when no charges are filed and no guilt is found. The story, which Sarah Stillman wrote for The New Yorker, revolves around the notorious town of Tenaha, TX, a small town on US 59 where a corrupt system allowed cops to pull over people — mostly brown people — and simply take away all their possessions: their cars, their cash, even the gold crosses around their necks. — Read the rest

Radley Balko posted about a woman in Wayne County who broke no laws yet had to pay $1,400 to get her car back when police seized it "after they mistook Vaughn's co-worker for a prostitute."

From a Detroit News article:

The Wayne County Sheriff's Office, which helps run the prosecutor's forfeiture unit, took in $8.69 million from civil seizures in 2007, more than four times the amount collected in 2001.

Cops and their kids get to use confiscated cars in St. Louis for free.

Seems that the city of St. Louis, like many cities, allows the police to confiscate the cars of people suspected (but not necessarily convicted) of certain crimes.

(UPDATE: Erika Bolstad says: "I saw your item about Rep. Bill Sali, and as the reporter who wrote the original stories about the ATF issue (in a newspaper, at least; this has been an issue on some Second Amendment and property rights blogs for a few months) thought you might want to consider other versions of the story. — Read the rest

The insurrectionary accouterments of Jacob Chansley, better known as QAnon Shaman, must be returned to him. A judge ordered the U.S. Justice Department to give him back the "unmistakeable outfit" confiscated when Chansley was arrested for his part in the Jan 6, 2021 riots on Capitol Hill. — Read the rest

Rhode Island's Red Flag laws: because if threatening an officer, exposing yourself, and urinating in a police car isn't enough, what is?

The Boston Globe recently published a harrowing story about a murder-suicide that took place in Rhode Island. Aside from the obvious horror of it—every murder-suicide is an awful tragedy regardless—this particular also illuminated some of the unfortunate shortcomings of so-called "Red Flag" laws. — Read the rest

ICE operated a fake school, the University of Farmington, supposedly as a sting operation to identify people living in the U.S. on illegal student visas. But it was really just a scam, taking tens of thousands of dollars from those who applied and subsequently refusing to return it irrespective of their immigration status. — Read the rest

Down-and-out former pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli is being sued for copying and distributing the one-of-a-kind Wu-Tang Clan album he purchased in 2015 for $2 million. According to PleasrDAO, a digital art collective that bought the album from the Department of Justice for $4 million after it was seized from Shkreli to pay off his debts, Shkreli violated the terms of both the original purchase agreement and the forfeiture order. — Read the rest

Martin Shkreli, infamously known as "PharmaBro," was convicted of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy back in 2017 for his involvement in some casual pharmaceutical price fixing, and swiftly established a reputation for his trollish douchebaggery.

At one point, Shkreli used his ill-gotten gains to purchase an incredibly rare Wu-Tang Clan album, of which only one single copy exists in the world. — Read the rest

The disgraced former president just can't help himself from spewing toxic sludge all over the Internet, and New York DA Alvin Bragg is doing his best to plug the hole. This morning Bragg filed a memorandum "In Support of the Motion for Contempt" against Donald Trump, who willfully violated a court order this week by attacking witnesses Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels on his sad little Truth Social platform. — Read the rest

A U.S. Marine was released from confinement last week and a sexual assault charge against him dropped. It emerged the 14-year-old girl he hid on barracks for days had told him online that she was 22.

He pleaded guilty to the remaining charge of breach of restriction for leaving base in a private vehicle… Rosario already served more than twice the maximum one-month confinement outlined as punishment for such cases.

Civil asset forfeiture allows police to take cash, vehicles and even houses from people without charging them. They get to keep the proceeds, and it's difficult to challenge in court. Studies show that more property is taken this way than is stolen by burglars, and now Kansas has joined the states reining in what reformers decry as legalized theft. — Read the rest

Family Dollar surely hates those meeces to pieces, but it didn't get rid of them and must pay a record fine for its vermin-infested warehouse. The company must pay more than $41m because of the "live rodents, dead and decaying rodents, rodent feces, urine and odors," the Justice Department reports. — Read the rest

Seward County has become Nebraska's capital of "civil forteiture," in which Sheriffs deputies pull over out-of-state motorists, confiscate any cash they find, and send them on their way without charging them with crimes. Though the state banned the practice years ago, a loophole in the law's wording effectively nullifies it and there's little point fighting to get the money back because local courts won't give it to you. — Read the rest

Dr. Oz promised in a tweet Sunday to "end illegal immigration" if he wins the Senate seat in November.

"As your United States Senator, I will fight to end illegal immigration and soft-on-crime policies that release dangerous, undocumented criminals into sanctuary cities," said his tweet. — Read the rest

Cops love using civil asset forfeiture laws to steal money from innocent people. They get to keep the money to buy fancy militarized armored vehicles and muscle cars with the money and they don't need to bother with arresting the people they legally rob from. — Read the rest

The Drug Enforcement Administration, well-known for its internal corruption, corrupting influence on others, racism, and making the world less equitable and more violent, begrudgingly returned $30,000 it took from Kermit Warren, "an out-of-work shoeshine man from New Orleans, was carrying nearly $30,000 in cash through the airport in Columbus, Ohio," reports NBC News. — Read the rest

Kermit Warren shined shoes at a hotel and collects scrap metal for a living. Besides serving in the Army Corps of Engineers, he is a deacon at his church and is a proud grandfather. None of that mattered to the Drug Enforcement Administration which used civil forfeiture laws to swipe his life savings that he was going to use to buy a truck. — Read the rest

The Very Christian Store Hobby Lobby has spent the last few years acquiring (read: smuggling) ancient cultural artifacts on the black market. As Séamus Bellamy wrote here in 2018:

Over the course of a few years, the craft supply and kitschy-shit store bought over 5,500 relics from dealers in the United Arab Emirates and Israel.