this post was submitted on 15 Jan 2026
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It's called 'civil forfeiture', been happening for literal decades (at least), and it's, unfortunately, probably legal.
Gotta love how being a cop in the US is so legal that we have to give them new, extra-legal ways to exist so they feel appreciated by the peasants.
It's absolutely not legal to immediately sell an asset gained via civil judicial forfeiture for personal gain.
It's a legal action filed against the property itself because they believe it was involved in a crime or purchasing with proceeds from a crime. It's basically charging the asset with a crime.
The state can sell the property, but only if no one has filed a claim contesting the seizure for a period of time. There are strict time limits and notification requirements before this can be done.
https://www.justice.gov/afp/types-federal-forfeiture#%3A%7E%3Atext=Civil+forfeiture+allows+the+government+to+file%2Creachable+through+criminal+forfeiture%2C+such+as+property
Thank you for the additional info.
In that case, civil forfeiture has been practiced illegally, nationwide, for a very long time. This practice is nothing new.
Yeah, legality and enforcement are two different things. But I don't think it's common for cops to immediately pawn stuff then try to claim civil forfeiture.
I feel like they're more likely to just lie and say it got lost, because otherwise a halfway decent lawyer could win a civil suit against them since they can't produce the 'defendant'.
I remember reading a whole lot about it during the Bush and Obama admins. The War on Terror was a great added excuse for backwoods cops to pull over brown people and rob them, and minorities (of course) were far less likely to lodge a complaint about it.