LessO2

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bocastephen

Absolutely disgusting. To add insult to injury, they actually demanded she strip?? Are these thugs for real?

Unfortunately, the law on the books still allows them to do this to people. My question is how did they find the cash? If the TSA turned her in, that is flat out wrong and her attorney needs to persue that. Turning passengers over who carry cash is so far outside their scope of authority I can't imagine anyone justifying it. If the DEA just approached her and demanded she open the bag, she should have refused until they got a warrant and she called her attorney to be present.

Most of the assets seized under this unconstitutional insult have belonged to innocent people. Just remember these laws came from Janet Reno - who was almost as wild an anti-constitutional freedom buster as Ashcroft. Unfortunately, I don't see the current administration promoting legislation to cancel the asset seizure laws.

Loose Cannon

What laws? I'd like to look it up.

FliesWay2Much

I did a search on her name in Google news and found a few other news stories. She was, in fact, travelling domestically! Unless there is other unreported evidence linking her to the drug business, I hope she sues the butt (pun intended!) off the DEA and kills a few careers in the process.

FWAAA

Agree with everything you posted. Absolutely disgusting.

The story says the money belt set off the metal detector.

Alleged TSA employees have posted here nearly unanimously that they see their mission as including ratting out anyone suspected of carrying too much money, as well as drugs.

bocastephen

There are federal statutes on the books since the Clinton Administration which permit federal, state and local law enforcement to seize assets (any type of property) of citizens without due process or proof. The laws specifically require the respondent to prove the asset was not derived from the proceeds of illegal activity.

Over the years, many law enforcement agencies (especially in Florida) have used these laws to unjustly enrich their coffers by seizing vehicles, cash, bank accounts and real property. There is evidence that police in some jurisdictions actually planted phony evidence, such as used marijuana joints in ashtrays, then used that 'evidence' to seize a vehicle which was later sold for profit or turned into a police car. Police departments across the country were found to exchange strategies to use these laws to their advantage to supplement dwindling budgets.

Search and seizures were conducted roadside as well as at airports, train stations and bus stations. Hundreds of millions of dollars in assets have been seized, most of it from innocent people (disproportionally minorities), and the government has gone out of its way to come up with any excuse to not return it, even though the laws state it must be returned if the respondent proves the asset was not derived from illegal activity.

besides the aforementioned evidence planting, I can add the apartment building in NYS that was seized when agents found one of the tenants growing marijuana in a bathtub even though the building owner had no way of knowing this was going on and the law actually prevented him from entering the apartment to see what activity was occuring on his property.

Also, there are laws on the books that require financial institutions and other businesses to report all monetary transactions you conduct with them to the Treasury Department and Customs, specifically any transaction over $10,000, or in the case of some gung-ho institutions like Bank of America, they will gladly report every transaction you do at or above $3,000. For example, if you go to a car dealership and pay for a car with a non-traceable instrument (like cash), the transaction is reported to the government. If you go the post office and buy $3,000 in money orders, the transaction is reported to the government.

Some people might support these laws as 'effective tools in the drug war', but I think they are a criminal attack against our Constitution and principles by a power hungry Executive Branch and a disinterested, misinformed Legislature.

FWAAA

Even worse, these asset forfeiture laws are now labeled "anti-terrorism" tools as well, so woe to the person snared in their trap.

[sarcasm]

How can any patriotic American be against "anti-terrorism" tools?

Don't you remember September 11?

Don't you know that everything changed that day?

[/sarcasm]

Cookie Jarvis

What they did to this poor woman is just terrible. From what the article reported, she didn't deserve this sort of treatment.

However, some questions do come to mind.

Why the hell would anyone want to travel with that much cash on them??? Wouldn't it be easier and safer to convert cash to a check?

da_guy

A few questions:

A woman from Boston is flying to Texas for a boob job? There are no plastic surgeons in Boston? In NYC? In Phily? in DC? She has to go all the way to Texas?

The woman works 2 jobs to uspport heself yet has $47K in spare money for plastic surgery?

Have any of you ever looked into plastic surgery prices? For the surgery she is claimimg to have been going for, $47K is about twice the price even the best doctors would charge.

She has to carry $47K in cash? This woman has never heard of a check? The doctor doesn't take checks? She couldn't wire the doctor the money?

She is flying to Texas? The I-35 corridor from the border to Dallas is the biggest source for drugs distribution into the rest of the country. Dallas has overtaken Miami in terms of drug distribution. Coincidence that she is going to Texas?

I don't care how much you hate the government, how much you hate the TSA, how much you hate the police, you cannot with a straight face tell me that you believe this woman was not going to Texas to buy drugs.

bocastephen

Seizing her money without proof she was going to buy drugs is wrong. We may 'think' that is her ultimate plan, but we dont arrest people or should we take property based on what someone thinks - that is reserved for totalitarian countries and movies like Minority Report.

If the police think she is buying drugs, let them prove it by arresting her when she makes the buy. Otherwise I am fine with her buying whatever she wants, as long as my Constitution and national principles are preserved. I am not sacrificing them for the drug war. I am not happy sacrificing them for the terror 'war', which we can pretty much universally agree is a more important issue.

Gene J

MSP used to have a newsletter for passengers where they bragged about confiscating money.

Once they confiscated $5000 from a little old lady on her way to Las Vegas. Unfortunately it was a congressmans mom.

We never heard about the follow up!

da_guy

So if the police see someone walking into a bank carrying a gun and wearing a ski mask, you wait for the robbery to happen then you arrest? After all you may think he's there to rob the bank, but you don't know for sure. There is no proof.

bocastephen

the comparion is flawed because anyone with a shred of common sense would understand the intent of someone dressed in a ski mask and carrying a gun is up to no good - however, should they be arrested? Not until they do the crime. Should they be questioned? Of course they should.

Carrying a sum of cash is a far less obvious marker of bad intent than walking into a bank with a gun and ski mask.

My contention is the law is flawed and unconstitutional. It should be stricken from the books. This whole case is flawed because the search which found the cash should not be permitted as criminal evidence when outside the scope of the TSA whose sole job is the search for prohibited items

FWAAA

Do you also forecast lottery numbers? If so, I'd like this Saturday's picks, please.

With a completely straight face, I don't believe she was headed to TX to buy drugs. Seriously.

I think she was a currency mule and was taking the cash proceeds from street sales to someone higher up the drug chain.

IMO, how much money a person is carrying is nobody's business, not even busybody cops and busybody cop wannabes.

Criminal activities shouldn't include carrying money. Not even a lotta money. If that's all the pigs got on her - then she should be free to go.

copwriter

I'll concede your argument that carrying a large sum of money should not, in itself, be interpreted as an indicator of criminal intent. But telling the TSA to ignore else anything they find while searching for prohibited items is nonsense. It's called "plain view doctrine." If a government agent (need not be an LEO) sees evidence of a crime while they are in a place they have a right to be, and looking for something they are authorized to look for, it's fair game. If the TSA opens your suitcase looking for a prohibited item, and instead finds a baggie of marijuana, it's your bad. By the way, nearly the same doctrine applies if I (as a private citizen) see you drop, say, a vial of cocaine into your bag just before you check it. There's nothing preventing me from walking up to the nearest airport cop and telling him what I saw. Given the exigent circumstances of your being in transit at that moment, he can probably make the search right then based on probable cause. He could certainly seize the suitcase and have me be the affiant for a search warrant.

My advice: leave your contraband at home when you travel. Better yet, don't have any at all. If the cops arrived at my door today with a search warrant for my house, I'd go watch TV while they executed the warrant. I already know what they're not going to find.