Sunday, May 20, 2012

Be Wary of the Police When You Are Carrying Large Amounts of Cash

This is an incredible story of how police will attempt to grab cash from innocent people.

This story is framed around Tennessee law, but I suspect similar activities are conducted in other parts of the country, some of it instigated by federal government agencies.

A few years back I was being driven to the Reno, NV airport by a very nice man who was gypsy cabbie, in the few short minutes I spoke to him, he was telling me about his son. he seemed to be a proud father.Then he was pulled over for speeding. After it was determined by the police that he was in the country illegally,he was handcuffed and the police asked me to step out of the car. I asked to retrieve my luggage from the trunk of the car, since the car was going to be towed. The first thing the police asked me at that point was whether I had any large amounts of money in the bags. They then asked to search the bags. Since I had pretty much nothing in the bags but dirty underwear and socks, I actually encouraged them to be thorough. But that really stuck in my mind as an odd question. If I did have a lot of money with me, so what?

The below clip may answer that question. We now, unfortunately, have to be very careful around the police, when carrying large amounts of money. Some of them will grab it, quicker than one of LBJ's great grand kids.



(ViaTeaPartyEconomist}

8 comments:

  1. Sick and criminal. This is the kind of crap you would expect in Mexico. Sadly this has been going on for decades all across the US. I am surprised he got it back. Usually you have to push them to charge you with a crime and then when you beat the charges you get your money back.

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  2. Exactly why, on my road trip to D.C. this week, I am swinging south and around both Tennessee and Kentucky. This kind of law enforcement mindset is a strong disincentive for me to spend my travel dollars there.

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  3. First mistake: Speeding (er, getting caught speeding). Second mistake: Truthfully answering the officer's question regarding the cash. Third mistake: Allowing a search. This formerly naive guy hopefully has learned his lesson. Protect your rights at all times and don't trust the police!

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  4. Anon, they don't even do this in Mexico. I've been stopped by police down here several times and I'm right in middle of the a cartel headquarters.

    Never admit anything to the police. Always record the police; it's legal in all 50 states now.

    I wrote an article for CopBlock.org about what to do when the police are involved. http://www.copblock.org/10572/what-to-do-when-the-cops-are-involved/

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  5. I will reiterate the third comment. My father is a retired peace officer and is a criminal defense attorney now and he told me the same thing. Put the burden of proof on the police and never agree to a search, even if that burden might be small it at least gives another thing for your lawyer to work with. He also had a case of "civil" forfeiture. You must prove your innocence.

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  6. Forget the cash part, Be Wary of the Police period, in that when you have sheriff's deputies running around in swat fatigues as we do up here in the PacNW, you already have a police state in principle.

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  7. Unfortunately this is not anything new, I knew about this when I was in high-school ~8 years ago, I gave a speech before my class about how this is a blatant violation of the prohibition on bills of attainder in the constitution. It's not just in Tennessee either, its all over the country. Most of the time the amount seized is less than ~$1000 so the cost of trying to recover it is higher than the sum confiscated. Of course it's not just cash they can seize there was a famous case recently where they seized a motel from an elderly couple who owned it free and clear because some people staying at the hotel had been busted for drugs. Of course the elderly couple had committed no crime but that doesn't matter because in Soviet Amerika the protection of individual liberty in the bill of rights and the other strict limits on governmental power in the constitution have been adjudicated out of existence by so-called "case-law" which basically says the government can seize whatever property it wants under the guise that it was "used in the commission of a crime", even if no one has been charged or convicted of a crime at all!

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  8. I have learned first hand that judges scoff at the constitution and back criminal acts committed by the police. I read directly from both the Bill of Rights and the Arizona Constitution to a judge one time to show him that he was not doing things according to law. He looked off to the side then looked at me and said, "that is not the way we do things." to which I responded, "Then you are not following your oath." (that didn't help me any) Unbelievable how they can ignore the rule of law. I also pointed out that if he is going to try to enforce the law against me, it is hypocritical and unethical not to follow the constitutions of both the State and Country-the very documents that grant him any authority he has and that in addition, if he does not follow the documents, he is in effect saying that the documents that grant him power are meaningless and that his own judgement is illegitimate and should be ignored in the same manner. (this didn't help me any either, but it was a damned if you do damned if you don't situation and I just wanted to see the swine squirm when he realized I was right. I could tell he didn't have any good answer and that he knew I was right. Didn't matter though.)

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