On Tuesday, Alabama Appleseed joined a diverse set of twelve organizations asking the U.S. Supreme Court to find that the Eighth Amendment’s excessive fines clause applies to the states. The case is Timbs v. Indiana. Mr. Timbs was arrested during an undercover drug enforcement operation, pled guilty, paid approximately $1,200 in fees, and was sentenced to home detention and probation. Months after his arrest, the government initiated a civil proceeding to forfeit Mr. Timbs’ personal vehicle that he had purchased with the proceeds of his father’s life insurance policy.

“Civil asset forfeiture has evolved from a program intended to strip illicit profits from drug kingpins into a revenue-generating scheme for law enforcement that is widely used against people — disproportionately African American — accused of low-level crimes or no crime at all,” said Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed. “We join a diverse set of organizations including the Drug Policy Alliance, FreedomWorks, NAACP, and Americans for Prosperity in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to recognize that civil asset forfeiture’s current incarnation has become a stark example of the abuse of power that the excessive fines clause was meant to curtail.”

This amicus brief highlights the broad, ideologically diverse consensus around the need to restrain governmental abuse of civil asset forfeiture programs.  In addition to Alabama Appleseed, signatories to the brief include the Drug Policy Alliance, FreedomWorks, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School, Americans for Prosperity, Law Enforcement Action Partnership, Independence Institute (Colorado), Libertas (Utah), Colorado Criminal Defense Bar, Drug Policy Forum of Hawai’i, and the Rio Grande Foundation (New Mexico).

The brief can be found here.

For more information about how Alabama law enforcement abuse civil asset forfeiture, read our report here (cited in the amicus).

In response to Governor Kay Ivey’s announcement today that the Alabama Comptroller will now require sheriffs to sign an affidavit swearing that they will use jail food money for jail food, the Southern Center for Human Rights and Alabama Appleseed Center for Law and Justice have released the following statements:

The following statement can be attributed to Aaron Littman, staff attorney at the Southern Center for Human Rights:

“We strongly commend Governor Ivey and Comptroller Baxter for taking concrete action to address the misappropriation of large amounts of taxpayer money by sheriffs across the state. As Governor Ivey explained recently, treating jail food funds as personal income is both unreasonable and unsupported by the law. It is long past time for this abuse of public trust to end.”

The following statement can be attributed to Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed Center for Law and Justice:

“Despite a long-standing Attorney General opinion stating that taxpayer dollars meant for jail food must be spent on jail food, some Alabama sheriffs have continued to treat jail food money as their own personal income. Today’s action by Governor Ivey will help ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent on public services. We thank Governor Ivey for bringing increased accountability to Alabama’s jail food program.”

Dr. Wayne Flynt, Professor Emeritus in the Department of History at Auburn University, will receive the 2018 Brewer/Torbert Public Service Award. First awarded in 2006, the award is given annually by Alabama Appleseed to an individual in Alabama who has demonstrated a substantial commitment to public service and the improvement of the lives of Alabamians.

Often referred to as the “Conscience of Alabama,” Dr. Flynt is one of the most recognized and honored scholars of Southern history, politics, and religion. Professor Flynt has spent his career teaching us how and why Alabama must do better.

“Dr. Flynt has devoted his life to issues affecting poverty and social justice, and his lessons have guided Alabama Appleseed in its pursuit of justice and equity for all,” said Frank McPhillips, chair of Alabama Appleseed’s Board of Directors. “The Brewer/Torbert Public Service Award luncheon will give us a platform to recognize Dr. Flynt’s distinguished commitment to these important principles.”

Dr. Flynt is a revered teacher, academic, and activist. During his 40 year teaching career at Samford and Auburn universities, he won 18 teaching awards. Dr. Flynt is the author of fourteen books (three co-authored), two of which were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Dr. Flynt served for a decade on the American Cancer Society’s Committee for the Socio-economically Disadvantaged, and was a co-founder of both the Alabama Poverty Project (now called ALABAMA POSSIBLE) and Sowing Seeds of Hope (Perry County).  He has also served on the boards of Voices for Alabama’s Children and the A+ education reform coalition. In 1993 he served at the request of Gov. James E. Folsom, Jr. and Circuit Judge Eugene Reese as the court facilitator in the Alabama equity funding lawsuit.

The Brewer/Torbert Public Service Award was named in honor of Alabama Appleseed founding board members Gov. Albert P. Brewer and Chief Justice C.C. Torbert, both of whom made significant contributions to the state, both personally and professionally. Past honorees include Bill Smith, Tom Carruthers, Gorman Houston, Odessa Woolfolk, Mike Warren, Mike Goodrich, Ralph Cook, Janie Shores, Fred Gray, Johnny Johns, Neal Berte, and John Carroll.

The 2018 Brewer-Torbert Public Service Award luncheon will be held on September 20, 2018 at 11:45am at the Harbert Center in Birmingham. For more information about the luncheon, including sponsorship opportunities, please visit www.alabamaappleseed.org/brewer-torbert-public-service-award/.

 

In two memos sent yesterday, Alabama Governor Kay Ivey announced that sheriffs may no longer personally profit from a very small portion of jail food funds: those state funds allocated for services in preparing and serving food to people in their jails. Contrary to media reports, these memos do not yet fully fix the problem of sheriffs personally pocketing these public funds.

In a statement, Governor Ivey said: “Public funds should be used for public purposes – it’s that simple.” While we applaud the Governor for taking a step towards accountability, her directive will have little practical impact on the problem it seeks to address. The reason is technical, but important. The Governor’s memos only prohibit sheriffs from personally profiting from what is referred to in § Ala. Code 14-6-43 as “food service allowance funds”. The memos do nothing to stop sheriffs from pocketing the far larger amounts of state monies that are provided, per §Ala. Code 14-6-42, for the cost of food itself.

The food service allowance funds make up a small fraction of the total amount that a sheriff receives. In 2017, across the state, sheriffs received $204,605.10 in food service allowance funds, and the far larger sum of $4,991,500.50 for food costs. This means that the food service allowance, which the Governor’s memo addresses, constituted less than 4% of the total amount of state jail food money given to sheriffs last year. In some counties, the difference was starker: in Baldwin County, Sheriff Huey Mack received a food service allowance of $4,106.25, and $293,980.75 to purchase food.

“We agree with Governor Ivey that the law does not permit the conversion of public funds – funds which are designated by statute for the feeding of prisoners – into personal income for sheriffs,” said Aaron Littman, an attorney at the Southern Center for Human Rights. “Unfortunately, unless this directive is revised, sheriffs will continue to pocket large amounts of taxpayer money from jail food accounts.”

“For decades some Alabama sheriffs have abused the public trust by placing personal profit over meeting the basic human needs of people in their care,” said Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed. “We thank Governor Ivey for taking the first step to rein in this abuse and urge Alabama legislators to heed her call to end this for good.”

Alabama Appleseed today applauded the Alabama Senate’s vote to “ban the box” (SB198) on state employment applications. Banning the box would lead to greater opportunities for people with a criminal history as they re-enter their communities and the workforce.

“Banning the box better ensures that Alabamians seeking state employment are judged on their merit, not their mistakes,” said Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed. “Denying a person’s application without considering their qualifications or rehabilitation prevents people who’ve completed their sentence from getting a fair chance at a fresh start.”

According to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), more than 650,000 individuals are released from prison every year. The DOJ has identified three key elements to successful re-entry into our communities, one of which is finding and keeping a job.

“This legislation would help make our communities safer,” said Knaack. “As the Department of Justice found, recidivism rates are reduced when individuals are able to successfully re-enter their communities. And a key element of successful re-entry is helping individuals find and keep a job. By removing the criminal background box from state employment applications, individuals seeking state employment have an honest shot at securing a job. It’s a win-win – it provides people with a second chance to make an honest living and makes our communities safer.”

SB198 now moves to the House.

For additional information regarding SB198, please read Alabama Appleseed’s fact sheet.

 

Today the Alabama Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance SB 213 (Senator Orr), which would end civil asset forfeiture in Alabama.

“Civil asset forfeiture allows the government to take and keep your cash, your car, or your house – even if you are never charged with a crime,” said Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed. “It turns the fundamental American principle of innocent until proven guilty on its head and has no place in Alabama.”

Under Alabama law, law enforcement keeps up to 100% of the proceeds from forfeited property. Under the federal program, Alabama law enforcement can keep up to 80% of the proceeds. Between state and federal programs, Alabama law enforcement received over $5 million in 2015 alone, and none of that required an indictment, much less a criminal conviction.

“Originally sold to the public as a tool for taking the ill-gotten gains of drug kingpins, civil asset forfeiture has strayed far from its alleged purpose,” Knaack said. “In 2015 alone, local and state government entities kept at least $670,000 from property owners who were never even charged with a crime.”

Under current law, the government is not required to report what they have taken to a centralized database. In order for Alabama Appleseed and the Southern Poverty Law Center to gather data for the report, Forfeiting Your Rights, the groups had to write a computer program, purchase thousands of dollars worth of court records, and spend hundreds of hours reviewing them one by one. In addition, of the 138 agencies that were sent open records requests, only one responded with information about expenditures from its forfeiture account. Most agencies didn’t respond at all.

“Our democracy cannot exist without a transparent and accountable government,” said Knaack. “Yet, to gather just a snippet of the abuses happening under the program we had to spend thousands of dollars for court records and spend hundreds of hours analyzing those records. That is the opposite of a transparent and accountable government.”

SB 213 would:

  • Require that the forfeiture process occur within the criminal case.

  • Protect innocent property owners.

  • Bring transparency to the forfeiture process.

  • Restrict the ability to abuse the federal forfeiture programs.

“This legislation is a win-win,” Knaack said. “Criminal forfeiture leaves in place the tools law enforcement needs to hold those who commit crimes accountable and places the burden back where it belongs – on the state.”

SB 213 now moves to the Senate floor.

The Alabama Appleseed and the Southern Poverty Law Center report on civil asset forfeiture can be found here: www.alabamaappleseed.org/report-forfeiting-your-rights/.

 

MONTGOMERY, Ala. – Courts in 14 Alabama counties awarded $2.2 million to law enforcement agencies through civil asset forfeiture actions filed in 2015 – and in a quarter of the 1,100 cases, law enforcement sought to keep property seized from people who were never even charged with a crime, according to a report released today by Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

The study – Forfeiting Your Rights – paints a disturbing picture of a legal process that was once intended to strip illicit profits from drug kingpins but has since evolved into a revenue-generating scheme for law enforcement, one that is now being widely used against people accused of low-level crimes, particularly marijuana offenses, or no crime at all.

Civil asset forfeiture has been widely condemned across the ideological spectrum as an abusive practice that deprives Alabamians of their due process and property rights. The 1,100 cases examined for the report represent 70 percent of all such cases filed in Alabama in 2015.

“In Alabama, law enforcement can take and keep your cash, your car or your house – even if you are never charged with a crime,” said Frank Knaack, executive director of Alabama Appleseed. “Civil asset forfeiture turns the basic American principle of innocent until proven guilty on its head. To make matters worse, law enforcement can keep and spend up to 100 percent of the proceeds of forfeited property, no strings attached. It’s a system that incentivizes the pursuit of profit over the fair administration of justice.”

Two Republican lawmakers today filed legislation that would, among other reforms, eliminate civil forfeiture by linking future forfeiture actions to criminal proceedings.

Under state law, law enforcement agencies can seize property on the mere suspicion that it was either involved in a crime or derived from certain criminal activity. A civil court then decides whether the agencies involved can keep it. In these court proceedings, while the initial legal burden falls on the prosecutor, the low standard of proof means that the property owner carries the burden of proving the property is “innocent” of the alleged crime.

“It’s time for Alabama lawmakers to place the burden where it belongs – on the government,” said Sam Brooke, deputy legal director for the SPLC. “Civil asset forfeiture is broken beyond repair. We urge legislators to ensure that only people convicted of a crime can lose their property through criminal forfeiture and to bring transparency and accountability to the forfeiture process. These reforms would protect due process rights and hold those who commit crimes accountable.”

Though rooted in centuries-old admiralty law, civil asset forfeiture gained widespread use in the 1980s and the following decades as part of the War on Drugs. Today, however, drug kingpins are rarely the target. The report found that in half of the cases examined where cash was seized, the amount of cash was $1,372 or less. Because that amount is often less than the typical cost of hiring an attorney to challenge the forfeiture, many cases go uncontested. In fact, in 52 percent of all cases filed across Alabama in 2015, the property owner did not challenge the forfeiture in court.

The original justification for civil asset forfeiture is further undermined by the fact that in 25 percent of the cases, the individual whose property was seized was never charged with a crime.  And in 18 percent of the cases where criminal charges were filed, the charge was simple possession of marijuana and/or paraphernalia.

Further, based on both the limited data on race in this study and interviews with lawyers who represent clients in civil forfeiture cases in Alabama, there appear to be racial disparities at work. The report found that in 64 percent of the cases that involved criminal charges, the defendant was African-American, even though African Americans comprise only about 27 percent of Alabama’s population.

The legislation introduced today by Sen. Arthur Orr (R-Decatur) and Rep. Arnold Mooney (R-Birmingham) would require that the forfeiture process occur within the criminal case; ensure that innocent property owners can quickly challenge the seizure of their property; require annual, centralized reporting of all seizures and forfeitures and what government agencies spend forfeiture proceeds on; and prohibit state and local government entities from receiving proceeds from federal forfeiture actions through what is known as the “equitable sharing” program.

“No criminal should be able to profit off of their crime,” Orr said. “Our laws must also protect innocent Alabama property owners. Currently, Alabama law does not provide those basic protections. Our legislation is a win-win: It ensures that law enforcement can hold the bad guys accountable and protects the rights of innocent Alabama property owners.”

Mooney added, “Individual liberty and property rights are not adequately protected under Alabama’s civil asset forfeiture laws. Our legislation strikes an equitable balance between individual rights and public safety. It preserves the ability of law enforcement to seize and keep the fruits of crime while restoring the doctrine of innocent until proven guilty.”

The report profiles Alabamians whose lives have been upended through their experience with civil asset forfeiture.

Dothan resident and car dealership owner James Vibbert had $25,000 seized from his bank account when prosecutors claimed that another man had used drug profits to buy vehicles from him. Even after a judge found Vibbert innocent and an assistant district attorney apologized for the charges, he had to hire a lawyer to get the money back in the civil proceedings.  

“I am finally back on my feet after the several months of court proceedings and years of trying to rebuild my reputation as a trustworthy businessman,” Vibbert said. “Even after I was found innocent, I still had to hire an attorney to get my money back from the government. The system is unjust and unfair, and nearly ruined my life.”

In addition to the $2.2 million awarded to 70 government entities in 14 counties in cases initiated in 2015, the report found that law enforcement agencies in the state gained an additional $3.1 million from forfeiture cases handled by the U.S. government.

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Alabama Appleseed is a non-profit, non-partisan 501(c)(3) organization founded in 1999 whose mission is to work to achieve justice and equity for all Alabamians. Alabama Appleseed is a member of the national Appleseed Network, which includes 18 Appleseed Centers across the U.S. and in Mexico City. For more information, visit www.alabamaappleseed.org.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, based in Alabama with offices in Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi, is a nonprofit civil rights organization dedicated to fighting hate and bigotry, and to seeking justice for the most vulnerable members of society. For more information, see www.splcenter.org.