Handheld card reader helps police track (and seize) criminals' cash

[JustSomeOldGuy]

4th amendment issues here?

https://gcn.com/articles/2016/09/13/pre ... ech_140916

[Charles L. Cotton]

I would think so, unless a warrant was obtained. LEOs get warrants to search someone's cell phones, so I suspect they will do the same with these.

Chas.

[KD5NRH]

It's already got an identifying number somewhere on it and pretty much always some sort of customer service contact info; why do they need to waste taxpayer money on something that could already be done with a phone call if they have legitimate cause?

[The Annoyed Man]

I couldn't fit it with a search, but I believe that we had a thread about this very topic, happening in Oklahoma, just a couple of months ago......except that in that case, police were using the card readers to electronically seize assets from people they stopped on the roadside.

[bblhd672]

I couldn't fit it with a search, but I believe that we had a thread about this very topic, happening in Oklahoma, just a couple of months ago......except that in that case, police were using the card readers to electronically seize assets from people they stopped on the roadside.

viewtopic.php?f=83&t=84515&p=1084324&hi ... a#p1084324

You're right, I thought this sounded familiar.

[baseballguy2001]

Civil forfeiture will never end, the government, at whatever level seizes the property, makes too much money from it. Lawmakers that propose ending it, are labeled as "soft on crime". It will never, ever, end.

[Rex B]

This seems like it's directly, if not very related, to civil asset forfeiture. I am typically pro-police, but that is one particular topic that really gets me and that I wish we could get rid of entirely.

Charge the person with a crime, follow the procedures, and get it done right. But "charging" money with a crime and taking it with very little recourse is wrong and completely against our American values.

"To get back the seized property, owners must prove it was not involved in criminal activity." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_for ... ted_States)

Completely and utterly backwards.

Absolutely! This practice is an abomination and shame on us for allowing it to continue!

[thatguyoverthere]

Absolutely! This practice is an abomination and shame on us for allowing it to continue!

When it is PROVEN in a COURT OF LAW that the law was broken, that's one thing. But we've all heard WAY too many stories of property being seized - and not being returned - when no charges were even brought at all!

Absolutely shameful.

[The Annoyed Man]

Absolutely! This practice is an abomination and shame on us for allowing it to continue!

When it is PROVEN in a COURT OF LAW that the law was broken, that's one thing. But we've all heard WAY too many stories of property being seized - and not being returned - when no charges were even brought at all!

Absolutely shameful.

What's even worse is that, often, even if gov't returns it, they negotiate returning pennies on the dollar, and plaintiff has to initiate a SECOND lawsuit to get all of it back. These people who do this are pure evil.