Cops plant evidence to meet quotas, compete with colleagues, and settle scores. Eased asset forfeiture with little oversight would just bribe them to do more damage.
J.D. Tuccille writes:
In January, a Baltimore police officer planted drug evidence before activating his body camera and “finding” the probable cause he and his buddies needed to make a bust, according to the city’s Office of the Public Defender. Images of the cop placing a soup can full of white capsules on the ground were captured in the 30-second buffer of the camera and then preserved after the device was officially turned on. Now prosecutors are reviewing 100 other cases in which the same trio of officers may have been up to similar shenanigans.
Most news reports are treating the incident as a peek at problems in troubled Baltimore’s police department. They need to look a little further afield.
These Baltimore officers, and their colleagues around the country, are the same cops that U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions thinks are burdened with excessive oversight. In April he vowed, “this Department of Justice will not sign consent decrees that will cost more lives by handcuffing the police instead of criminals.” And just days ago, Sessions rededicated his department to working with local law enforcement on civil asset forfeiture efforts that bypass the need for criminal convictions to seize property—and also bypass state and local safeguards. Forfeited funds are split between federal and local agencies in a lucrative arrangement for everybody but the victims. “Equitable sharing” collaboration between federal and local agencies was suspended under former Attorney General Eric Holder, but the new regime is jump-starting the program
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