[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                         FORFEITING OUR RIGHTS:
                       THE URGENT NEED FOR CIVIL
                        ASSET FORFEITURE REFORM

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

            SUBCOMMITTEE ON CIVIL RIGHTS AND CIVIL LIBERTIES

                                 OF THE

                         COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
                               AND REFORM

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                            DECEMBER 8, 2021

                               __________

                           Serial No. 117-57

                               __________

      Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Reform
      
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                       Available on: govinfo.gov
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                             docs.house.gov
                             
                               __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
46-284 PDF                 WASHINGTON : 2022                     
          
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                   COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND REFORM

                CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York, Chairwoman

Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of   James Comer, Kentucky, Ranking 
    Columbia                             Minority Member
Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts      Jim Jordan, Ohio
Jim Cooper, Tennessee                Virginia Foxx, North Carolina
Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia         Jody B. Hice, Georgia
Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois        Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin
Jamie Raskin, Maryland               Michael Cloud, Texas
Ro Khanna, California                Bob Gibbs, Ohio
Kweisi Mfume, Maryland               Clay Higgins, Louisiana
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York   Ralph Norman, South Carolina
Rashida Tlaib, Michigan              Pete Sessions, Texas
Katie Porter, California             Fred Keller, Pennsylvania
Cori Bush, Missouri                  Andy Biggs, Arizona
Shontel M. Brown, Ohio               Andrew Clyde, Georgia
Danny K. Davis, Illinois             Nancy Mace, South Carolina
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Florida    Scott Franklin, Florida
Peter Welch, Vermont                 Jake LaTurner, Kansas
Henry C. ``Hank'' Johnson, Jr.,      Pat Fallon, Texas
    Georgia                          Yvette Herrell, New Mexico
John P. Sarbanes, Maryland           Byron Donalds, Florida
Jackie Speier, California            Vacancy
Robin L. Kelly, Illinois
Brenda L. Lawrence, Michigan
Mark DeSaulnier, California
Jimmy Gomez, California
Ayanna Pressley, Massachusetts

                      Russ Anello, Staff Director
               Devon Ombres, Subcommittee Staff Director
                    Amy Stratton, Deputy Chief Clerk

                      Contact Number: 202-225-5051

                  Mark Marin, Minority Staff Director
                                 ------                                

            Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties

                    Jamie Raskin, Maryland, Chairman
Kweisi Mfume, Maryland               Nancy Mace, South Carolina, 
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Florida        Ranking Minority Member
Robin Kelly, Illinois                Jim Jordan, Ohio
Ayanna Pressley, Massachusetts       Andy Biggs, Arizona
Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of   Scott Franklin, Florida
    Columbia                         Byron Donalds, Florida
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York   Clay Higgins, Louisiana
Rashida Tlaib, Michigan
Danny K. Davis, Illinois
                        
                        
                        C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page
Hearing held on December 8, 2021.................................     1

                               Witnesses

Mr. Daniel Alban, Senior Attorney and Co-Director, National 
  Initiative to End Forfeiture Abuse Institute for Justice
Oral Statement...................................................     6
Ms. Malinda Harris, Victim of Civil Asset Forfeiture
Oral Statement...................................................     8
Professor Louis S. Rulli, Practice Professor of Law, Director of 
  Civil Practice Clinic & Legislative Clinic University of 
  Pennsylvania Carey Law School
Oral Statement...................................................    10
Ms. Aamra Ahmad, Senior Policy Counsel, American Civil Liberties 
  Union
Oral Statement...................................................    11

Written opening statements and statements for the witnesses are 
  available on the U.S. House of Representatives Document 
  Repository at: docs.house.gov.

                           Index of Documents

                              ----------                              

  * Report by the Institute of Justice regarding the forfeiture 
  process at the federal level; submiitted by Chairman Raskin.

  * Editorial by the Charleston Post and Courier regarding 
  property being seized without charges; submitted by Rep. Mace.

  * Washington Post article regarding annual reports that are 
  submitted by local and state agencies to the Justice 
  Department's Equitable Sharing Programs; submitted by Rep. 
  Wasserman Schultz.

  * Report by the Institute of Justice, titled ``Policing for 
  Profit''; submitted by Chairman Raskin.

  * Report by the Institute of Justice, titled ``Does Forfeiture 
  Work?''; submitted by Chairman Raskin.

  * Policy brief by ACLU, titled ``Profiting from California's 
  Most Vulnerable''; submitted by Chairman Raskin.

  * Report by Center for American Progress, titled ``Forfeiting 
  the American Dream''; submitted by Chairman Raskin.

  * Letter signed by 16 nonprofit groups supporting federal civil 
  asset forfeiture reforms (March 15, 2015); submitted by 
  Chairman Raskin.

Documents are available at: docs.house.gov.

 
                         FORFEITING OUR RIGHTS:
                       THE URGENT NEED FOR CIVIL
                        ASSET FORFEITURE REFORM

                              ----------                              


                      Wednesday, December 8, 2021

                   House of Representatives
                  Committee on Oversight and Reform
           Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in 
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, and via Zoom. The 
Hon. Jamie Raskin (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
    Present: Representatives Raskin, Wasserman Schultz, Kelly, 
Pressley, Norton, Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Davis, Mace, Sessions, 
Biggs, and Donalds.
    Also present: Representative Clyde.
    Mr. Raskin. The committee will come to order. Without 
objection, the chair is authorized to declare a recess of the 
committee at any time.
    And I am now going to recognize myself for an opening 
statement.
    Good morning. Thank you to our witnesses for joining us 
today, and thanks to all the members for coming to participate 
in this critical hearing.
    I want to thank my friend, the ranking member Congresswoman 
Mace, and her staff for working so closely with us in 
coordinating today's hearing.
    This bipartisan hearing will be the first that Congress has 
held in nearly seven years focused on the need to reform the 
use of our civil asset forfeiture laws. Civil asset forfeiture 
is a tool used widely by federal, state, and local law 
enforcement to seize assets that are believed to be connected 
to criminal activity, either as an instrument of criminal 
activity or a proceed of criminal activity.
    Law enforcement, under the civil asset forfeiture laws, can 
seize money, cars, vans, boats, and other vehicles, even 
people's homes and offices, and then keep the cash or sell the 
property to augment their agency's budget, their auto fleets, 
their holiday party and social activity funds, athletic and 
gymnastic facilities, and other government facilities and 
activities.
    Because these laws often lack the bare minimum of due 
process protections, many of these operations are, in fact, 
trampling every major component of constitutional due process. 
Law enforcement agents can seize and permanently deprive people 
of their assets without ever arresting them, much less charging 
them with a crime, much less convicting them of a crime. And 
that is why we call this civil asset forfeiture because the 
state is not going through the ordinary criminal process and 
sustaining the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt 
someone has committed a crime. Rather, people's property is 
just being seized.
    And again, you don't have to prove beyond a reasonable 
doubt or even by a preponderance of the evidence in court first 
that the property is somehow tainted by crime. You don't even 
have to charge the person. You don't even have to arrest the 
person. The state is just seizing the property.
    And law enforcement agents can seize and forfeit assets of 
innocent third-party owners even if the person whose property 
is being seized had no knowledge that their property was being 
allegedly used in connection with a suspected crime. Under this 
system, a grandmother's car or a parent's apartment can be 
seized if police suspect that the grandchild or child is 
possessing drugs or committing some other kind of criminal 
offense on the property. That is an outrageous breach of the 
most basic concepts of civil justice, due process, and property 
rights. And too often these seizures become permanent, even if 
charges are never brought against a person whose assets are 
seized.
    Even if criminal charges are never even brought, it can be 
extremely difficult, virtually impossible to recover your 
property. So, civil asset forfeitures flip the constitutional 
standards of a citizen's presumption of innocence and the 
government's duty or burden to prove guilt on their head. Just 
flip it over and, thus, deprive people of their due process 
rights.
    In most cases, law enforcement can seize and keep the 
property using a very low evidentiary burden. Even if it does 
get to court, even if the person whose property is seized goes 
to court, finds a lawyer, pays to go, even then the lowest 
evidentiary burden of simple reasonable suspicion of crime is 
what is often used, and hearsay is often used in the process.
    Conversely, the property owner must be the one who goes to 
court and affirmatively prove that their assets are not 
connected to a crime or that they had no knowledge that they 
were connected to a crime. Your property, in essence, is 
presumed guilty, and this is a scandalous inversion of due 
process.
    Because these are civil rather than criminal actions, poor 
Americans who are caught up in this process have no right to 
appointed counsel. The civil forfeiture proceedings are 
bewilderingly complex to navigate for laypeople. A single 
filing error can result in permanent forfeiture, and the value 
of seized assets is often less than it would cost to hire an 
attorney in the case of someone just having a small amount of 
money taken from them on the street, for example. As a result, 
civil asset forfeitures are rarely challenged, and successful 
challenges are very rare.
    Meanwhile, law enforcement agencies in many states keep the 
proceeds from forfeited assets, leading to massive windfalls in 
some police department or sheriff department budgets. This is 
true even in states that have abolished civil asset forfeiture 
because of a massive loophole in the federal law we will 
discuss today called the Adoption and Equitable Sharing 
Programs.
    Under these programs, seizures made by state and local law 
enforcement can be adopted by a federal agency for forfeiture, 
and then up to 80 percent of those revenues can be equitably 
shared and returned to the seizing agency. This creates a 
perverse profit incentive because law enforcement agencies can 
keep the revenues from forfeitures with little, if any, 
oversight as to how the money is being spent.
    In 2018, federal and state law enforcement seized and 
forfeited more than $2 billion worth of cash and assets from 
Americans using these processes. From 2000 to 2018, state and 
federal agencies combined obtained more than $68.8 billion 
through forfeitures. Despite these massive sums, high-value 
forfeitures remain the exception, not the rule. In fact, most 
seizures, usually of cash or cars, are for quite low values and 
are taken from people primarily living in communities of color 
in low-income areas.
    Between 2015 and 2019, the average forfeiture amount under 
state law was $1,276 per incident. In several states, the 
median amount forfeited is far less than that. Half of all 
forfeitures in Michigan, for example, were less than $423 in a 
two-year period, and in Pennsylvania, they were less than $369 
in 2018.
    Moreover, numerous studies reflect that communities of 
color are disproportionately affected. For instance, between 
2012 and 2018, more than half of the forfeitures occurring in 
Philadelphia came in four low-income Black and Latino majority 
zip codes. Between 2014 and 2016, 65 percent of the people 
targeted for forfeiture in South Carolina were African-American 
men, despite their making up just 13 percent of the state 
population.
    The 2016 ACLU of California study found that 85 percent of 
equitable sharing payments went to law enforcement agencies 
serving in majority minority communities. We cannot have an 
honest conversation about civil asset forfeiture without 
acknowledging its connection to greater issues of the targeting 
of communities of color by law enforcement in particular 
communities.
    In 2015, then-Attorney General Holder issued an order that 
curbed federal adoptions to a limited degree and prohibited 
equitable sharing revenues from being spent on militarized 
equipment. Even though these limitations were applied narrowly, 
they were rescinded by Attorney General Sessions in 2017.
    It is time for DOJ to reinstate the protections provided by 
the Eric Holder memorandum and to conduct a comprehensive 
review of its civil forfeiture program to ensure that basic 
civil rights and civil liberties are being protected. But this 
isn't enough. We need lasting legislative reform.
    Thankfully, there is near universal recognition now that 
civil asset forfeiture practices are rife with abuse and ripe 
for reform. Since 2014, 36 states and D.C. have taken steps to 
reform their regimes, and four states--Maine, Nebraska, New 
Mexico, and North Carolina--have eliminated it entirely.
    But these efforts are being undermined by federal equitable 
sharing, which is like a run-around or an end run, and we need 
to deal with it by passing the sweeping reforms contained in 
the FAIR Act that we will discuss today. Congress must act to 
ensure lasting reforms to federal civil asset forfeiture 
programs.
    I am proud to be the lead Democratic cosponsor of H.R. 
2857, the FAIR Act, along with my good friend Congressman Tim 
Walberg of Minnesota. This bill will, among other things, raise 
the level of proof required by the government to keep a 
forfeiture to clear and convincing evidence. It will require 
all revenues to be deposited in the general Treasury fund, 
rather than being returned directly to state and local law 
enforcement agencies.
    I am pleased as well that many of my colleagues on this 
committee have joined Mr. Walberg and me in cosponsoring this 
bill. This is how Congress should be operating in the interests 
of protecting the rights of all Americans, rather than engaging 
in our constant habits of partisan polemic and invective.
    I hope that we can continue working together to confront 
this mostly invisible, but still egregiously outrageous 
injustice that civil asset forfeiture imposes on so many 
Americans. And I look forward to hearing the testimony of our 
distinguished witnesses today.
    With that, I now recognize my esteemed ranking member, Ms. 
Mace, for her opening statement.
    Ms. Mace. And thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank you, 
Chairman Raskin, for holding today's hearing on a question that 
couldn't be more important to the American people or 
fundamental to our Nation's identity as founded in our 
Constitution, the ability of people to be secure in their 
property.
    In the case of civil asset forfeiture, there is no 
requirement that the property owner be convicted of a crime, 
let alone charged with any sort of offense. And I want to quote 
this morning, first of all, my hometown newspaper, the 
Charleston Post and Courier. As we were discussing earlier 
before the hearing today, I worked on civil asset forfeiture as 
a state lawmaker before coming up here to Congress, and it is 
an honor to work with you on these issues and to have this 
hearing today. It is an important hearing.
    The Post and Courier a few years ago reported on 
investigations by the Post and Courier and the Greenville News 
in 2017, and their investigation showed how the law was 
incentivized, law enforcement agencies, to seize assets, 
sometimes without even filing criminal charges and put people 
in the legally backward position of having to prove their 
innocence to get their property back, which is completely 
opposite of what the Constitution would, I believe, require.
    The Post and Courier also stated the Greenville News series 
that did this large investigation looked at some 3,200 seizures 
and $17.6 million in assets taken over a three-year period in 
South Carolina. In about 800 cases of those 3,200, or 25 
percent, there were no criminal charges filed. And in another 
800 cases in which charges were filed, there were no 
convictions.
    The series, the investigation by the Greenville News, also 
found that roughly two-thirds of seized assets came from Black 
men, calling into question whether the law was being applied 
fairly. And as the chairman rightly recognized, this 
disproportionately affects communities of color, and those who 
are poor are also unfairly and unevenly treated in these cases.
    The writers of our country's Declaration of Independence 
held several truths to be self-evident, that all are created 
equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain 
unalienable rights. And those are life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness.
    Our Constitution guarantees those rights explicitly in the 
text. The Fifth Amendment prohibits the Federal Government from 
depriving people of life, liberty, or property without due 
process of law. And in so many cases, as the chair has 
recognized, that is not happening.
    Likewise, the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits states from 
depriving any person of life, liberty, or property again 
without due process of law. But civil asset forfeiture too 
often creates an end run around the constitutional guarantee of 
due process. Too often civil asset forfeiture creates a ``seize 
first, ask questions later'' approach and incentive.
    We do want to prevent criminals from continuing to use 
their property in the commission of criminal offenses and 
crimes or to enjoy the property derived illegal activity. They 
shouldn't be doing it, obviously. But asset forfeiture, 
pursuant to a criminal charge and conviction, is a sound means 
of ensuring criminals do not benefit from the proceeds of their 
crimes, and defendants should be proven guilty beyond a 
reasonable doubt.
    Civil asset forfeiture is an action against the property, 
and those property owners who have assets seized have no 
guarantee to an attorney to help them navigate a very 
complicated and most often expensive and costly legal 
proceeding. They usually cannot afford to contest the 
forfeiture in a proceeding in which the government has a very 
low burden of proof.
    In fact, it often costs well more for an attorney than the 
seized assets are worth, leading many forfeiture actions just 
to simply go untested because it is unaffordable to fight in 
court. Many innocent activities have led to authorities seizing 
assets, which are often very difficult to get back through any 
forfeiture proceeding.
    Small business owners have been wrongly accused of 
structuring, which is the practice of depositing or withdrawing 
less than $10,000 to avoid bank reporting laws, even though 
there are a number of reasons to deposit $9,000 in a bank. 
Those affected have had their entire bank accounts seized, 
tying up all of their operating capital for months, if not 
years, in complicated legal proceedings, all without ever being 
charged with a crime.
    Others have had their life's savings confiscated by the 
government merely for carrying large amounts of cash, again 
without being charged with any criminal offense. A report by 
the Institute for Justice shows the median cash seizure in 
states is only about $1,300, which is well below the amount of 
money it would cost to hire an attorney to contest the 
forfeiture.
    This is a real problem in our country, one that Congress 
should seriously debate and consider reforming, which is why we 
are doing this today. So, thank you. And certainly, there are 
simple, common sense reforms that we all could get behind to 
restore the Constitution's guarantee of due process outlined by 
the chairman this morning.
    But for example, it should be easier for litigants 
representing themselves to navigate and contest any forfeiture 
action. We should guarantee their right to a quick hearing, 
where the government must show cause for why the property was 
seized in the first place. And we should consider whether it is 
proper for funds to be returned directly to the authority 
seizing those funds in the first place or whether those funds 
should be deposited, as you mentioned, in the general Treasury, 
if not returned directly to victims that are affected.
    I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today. So, 
thank you for spending your time with us and sharing your 
knowledge and expertise and personal experiences about the 
scope of this issue across the country and what we could be and 
should be doing as legislators in Congress to solve it.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back.
    Mr. Raskin. And thank you, Ms. Mace, for those super 
thoughtful and lucid remarks you just made.
    I want to now introduce our witnesses today and swear them 
in.
    Our first witness is Daniel Alban, a senior attorney and 
co-director for the National Initiative to End Forfeiture Abuse 
at the Institute for Justice, which is a primary actor in this 
field. And I, too, like Ms. Mace, worked on this problem in 
Annapolis when I was a state senator, and the Institute for 
Justice was a critical resource we relied on. So, thank you for 
being with us, Mr. Alban.
    Then we are going to hear from Malinda Harris of 
Springfield, Massachusetts, who was a victim of civil asset 
forfeiture.
    Then we are going to hear from Professor Louis Rulli, a 
practice professor of law and director of the Civil Practice 
Clinic and Legislative Clinic at the UPenn Carey Law School.
    Finally, we will hear from Aamra Ahmad, a senior policy 
counsel at the ACLU.
    The witnesses will be unmuted, please, or stand so we can 
swear them in. Please raise your right hands. Great.
    Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you are about to 
give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, 
so help you God?
    [Response.]
    Mr. Raskin. All right. Let the record show that all of the 
witnesses answered in the affirmative today.
    Thank you. Without objection, your written statements are 
going to be made part of the record.
    Now you are recognized for five minutes. And with that, Mr. 
Alban, you will go first.

  STATEMENT OF DANIEL ALBAN, SENIOR ATTORNEY AND CO-DIRECTOR, 
  NATIONAL INITIATIVE TO END FORFEITURE ABUSE, INSTITUTE FOR 
                            JUSTICE

    Mr. Alban. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and the members of this 
committee, for the opportunity to testify about the urgent need 
for civil forfeiture reform.
    My name is Dan Alban. I am a senior attorney at the 
Institute for Justice and the co-director of our National 
Initiative to End Forfeiture Abuse. IJ is a national nonprofit 
public interest law firm. For 30 years, we have litigated cases 
nationwide on behalf of individuals whose constitutional rights 
have been violated by the government.
    IJ has been litigating civil forfeiture cases since the 
1990's, and we are currently litigating over a dozen forfeiture 
cases in courts across the country. We have also conducted 
extensive research on the use of civil forfeiture nationwide 
and have published numerous studies based on that research, 
including three editions of ``Policing for Profit,'' the 
Nation's only comprehensive study on civil forfeiture laws in 
all 50 states and at the federal level.
    In recent years, we have also published multiple studies 
based on Federal Government data that found that civil 
forfeiture is ineffective at fighting crime, but it is used to 
generate more revenue when there are budget shortfalls. Those 
findings highlight why civil forfeiture is a national disgrace. 
It is not just ripe for abuse. It is inherently abusive.
    Our civil forfeiture laws violate due process, encourage 
widespread abuse of civil liberties, pose a terrible threat to 
property rights, and distort and divert law enforcement 
priorities away from preventing and solving crimes toward 
raising revenue. Civil forfeiture turns the presumption of 
innocence on its head and effectively permits the government to 
punish someone for a crime without actually convicting them of 
that crime. That is not just deeply unjust, it is un-American.
    But civil forfeiture continues throughout the United States 
because law enforcement has a strong financial incentive to use 
it. It gets to keep the money. Up to 100 percent of forfeited 
money goes to funds controlled entirely by law enforcement, 
with little oversight by Congress, state legislatures, or city 
council. That not only violates the separation of powers, it 
distorts law enforcement priorities, incentivizing policing for 
profit.
    But civil forfeiture--unsurprisingly, the vast majority of 
forfeiture done under federal law is civil in nature. From 2000 
to 2019, civil forfeitures made up 84 percent of all 
forfeitures done by DOJ agencies and 98 percent of forfeitures 
done by Treasury agencies. During that time, at least $69 
billion was seized and forfeited nationwide, and the Federal 
Government paid out nearly $9 billion to state and local law 
enforcement agencies through the Federal Equitable Sharing 
Program.
    While forfeiture generates massive amounts of money for law 
enforcement, the size of a typical forfeiture is quite modest. 
The median DOJ agency currency forfeiture is $12,090. In other 
words, half of DOJ currency forfeitures are under $12,000. The 
median currency forfeiture by Treasury agencies is just $7,320, 
while the state median currency forfeiture is about $1,000.
    These figures indicate that forfeiture targets everyday 
people far more often than drug kingpins. Even worse, the 
federal forfeiture system involves a very complex set of 
procedures that is nearly impossible for a layman to navigate. 
We have prepared an infographic, which I am holding up now, 
that demonstrates the incredible complexity of the federal 
forfeiture process and how many ways there are to lose a civil 
forfeiture case, but very few ways to win.
    Congress must act to fix this injustice. First, Congress 
should eliminate the profit incentive that drives most civil 
forfeiture by diverting all forfeiture proceeds to the general 
fund. Law enforcement should not get to control the money it 
forfeits. All spending should be done through the normal 
appropriations process and subject to legislative oversight.
    Second, Congress should abolish the Federal Equitable 
Sharing Program, which drives so much abuse at the state and 
local level. Equitable sharing allows state law enforcement to 
circumvent state law by sending their forfeitures to the Feds. 
Equitable sharing should be abolished to preserve federalism 
and let states implement greater protections for property 
rights than are available under federal law.
    Third, Congress should eliminate the byzantine 
administrative forfeiture process that makes it extremely 
difficult for property owners to contest a forfeiture. Property 
owners deserve their day in court, in a real court with a 
neutral Article III judge. They should not lose their property 
because the seizing agency makes a self-serving determination 
that it was right to seize and forfeit their property.
    Finally, to truly fix this problem, civil forfeiture should 
be replaced entirely by criminal forfeiture. Until forfeiture 
is limited to criminal matters, the government will continue to 
punish people for alleged unlawful activity without actually 
convicting them of a crime. That is contrary to the American 
system of justice and cannot stand.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
    Mr. Raskin. And thank you for your excellent testimony, Mr. 
Alban.
    Ms. Harris, you are now recognized for your five minutes.

STATEMENT OF MALINDA HARRIS, VICTIM OF CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE, 
                   SPRINGFIELD, MASSACHUSETTS

    Ms. Harris. Good morning. First, I would just like to thank 
the committee for inviting me here to testify. This is what 
happened with me and to give me a voice. So, thank you for 
that.
    My name is Malinda Harris. I am 61 years old. I am a single 
parent of three boys. I was born in Greenville, South Carolina. 
I currently reside in Springfield, Massachusetts.
    In 2015, my car was taken from me----
    Mr. Raskin. Ms. Harris, forgive me. Will you just make sure 
you speak directly into your microphone or as close as you can 
get? We don't want to miss any of your important words.
    Ms. Harris. OK. Is that better? Can you hear me?
    Mr. Raskin. That is great.
    Ms. Harris. OK, great. In 2015, my son Trevice Harris was 
coming off a vacation, and he asked if I could pick him up at 
the airport. I did so and returned home. He asked if he could 
borrow my car. I let him. He dropped me off, and about 10:30 
that night, I got a phone call from him. I could tell something 
was wrong, but I wasn't quite sure what. He told me to come 
where to pick my car up at.
    When I went to pick my car up, as soon as I put my hands on 
the door handle, about five, six police officers came from out 
of nowhere. One of them even had his hand on his holster, and 
they told me that they were going to seize my car because it 
was suspected of being involved in criminal activity.
    And I'm like, ``I don't know what you are talking about. 
This is my car.'' They wasn't trying to hear it. They told me 
that, basically, if I didn't give them the keys, they would--
that the car may be damaged, but whether I give it to them or 
not, the car was coming with them.
    They had no warrant. They didn't show me any paperwork. I 
never got a receipt for my car. Basically, told me they were 
taking the car, and that's what they did.
    So, the next day, I went down to the police station to find 
out what's going on and how to get my car back, and they 
wouldn't give me any information. Said it was part of an 
ongoing investigation, and so that was pretty much that.
    Fast forward in I think it was 2020, I got a letter in the 
mail stating that they were going to keep the car unless I 
answered to them. I called to find out what needed to be done. 
They told me I need a lawyer.
    I couldn't get a lawyer because I couldn't afford a lawyer 
at the time, and I needed to answer these things I had. They 
gave me 23 days, and by the time the letter got to me, I had 
like two weeks. And couldn't afford one, plus with the pandemic 
going on, you couldn't get a legal aide or anything. So, I was 
kind of left out there again.
    So, I was trying to get more time. I contacted the D.A.'s 
office to see if I could get more time. They basically told me 
I need to get a lawyer to put into for more time to get a 
lawyer. It was a very difficult time, and if it wasn't for the 
Goldwater Institute and taking my case pro bono, I wouldn't 
have gotten my car back.
    But fortunate for me, they did a great job, and I was able 
to get the car back, and I was able to give it to Trevice's 
daughter when she graduated.
    The forfeiture was very, very stressful, and if it wasn't 
for them--it was a bad time. My son Trevice--let me just say 
this quickly. My son Trevice was killed in 2018, murdered. So, 
and it was in the same month. So, my thoughts were all over the 
place. It was a very difficult time. And thank you for the 
Goldwater Institute. My car was returned. So, I gave it to my 
granddaughter.
    And why I think this reform is important is for a lot of 
reasons that were already stated because I don't believe people 
should be allowed to police for profit, and I think that they 
should have a better burden of proof. And also if they're going 
to do it, the money should be--they should be held accountable 
how the money is spent. And I really think it should go back 
into the community from which it was taken and do some good 
there, as opposed to lavish parties and trips to wherever.
    So, once again, I thank you for allowing me to come and 
share my story, and I truly hope this bill passes because I 
think it's very important.
    Thank you.
    Mr. Raskin. Ms. Harris, thank you for your wonderful 
testimony. We are very sorry to hear about the loss of your 
son, and thank you for joining us today and sharing your story.
    Professor Rulli, you are now recognized for your five 
minutes of testimony.

    STATEMENT OF LOUIS S. RULLI, PRACTICE PROFESSOR OF LAW, 
   DIRECTOR OF CIVIL PRACTICE CLINIC AND LEGISLATIVE CLINIC, 
         UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA CAREY SCHOOL OF LAW

    Mr. Rulli. Thank you so much, Chairman. I appreciate the 
offer to testify today, and I commend the subcommittee for 
holding such an important hearing.
    I direct a civil practice clinic at the University of 
Pennsylvania law school, where our students have represented 
low-income property owners in civil forfeiture proceedings over 
the past 20 years. Our clinic's work on civil forfeiture was 
highlighted in a cover story in the New Yorker magazine in 
2013, entitled ``Taken.''
    We were introduced to civil forfeiture 20 years ago, when a 
77-year-old Black homeowner who had end-stage renal disease was 
served with a petition for forfeiture of her home. She was 
never charged with a crime. She was never suspected of any 
criminal activity. It had to do with a neighborhood boy who was 
unrelated to her. But nonetheless, the prosecutor sought to 
take her home.
    I remember distinctly her saying something to me that many 
clients would say to me over 20 years, and that was, ``Why is 
the government trying to take my home when I didn't do anything 
wrong?''
    The New Yorker article was about our representation of Mary 
and Leon Adams, an African-American couple living in West 
Philadelphia. Prosecutors brought a civil forfeiture action 
against their home because their adult son was engaged in some 
small marijuana sales to a confidential informant. It had 
nothing to do with Mary and Leon Adams.
    They were 68 and 70 years of age, upright, law-abiding 
citizens who had never been charged with a crime in their life, 
and nor were they charged or suspected of any criminal activity 
here. It was all related to their adult son. Nonetheless, 
prosecutors sought to take their home permanently.
    Just recently, a local judge called me, seeking 
representation for a 14-year-old high school student who 
resided with his mother in a home that he inherited from his 
grandfather. The student's father did not live with them, but 
apparently or allegedly was involved in some low-level drug 
sales two miles from the property.
    Nonetheless, never charged with any criminal activity, 
either mom or the high school student, prosecutors filed a 
civil forfeiture action to take the student's home.
    Civil forfeiture is not just about homes. It's about cash, 
and it's about cars. And in terms of cash, the police 
confiscated a piggybank belonging to our client's young 
daughter when they searched her home. They never charged her 
with any criminal activity. She wasn't involved in anything. 
The piggybank contained the young girl's birthday money, 
totaling $91. Prosecutors refused to give back that piggybank 
to her daughter.
    These cases ended favorably only because there was free 
legal representation. A 70-year-old widow in failing health had 
both her home and her car seized by police and forfeited, 
putting her on the street at age 70, only to have years later 
the Pennsylvania Supreme Court finally rule in her favor.
    Let's be clear. For the decade between 2005 and 2014, 
prosecutors in Philadelphia forfeited 746 homes, 1,938 cars, 
$34.2 million in cash. That's just one city alone.
    Reform of civil forfeiture is long overdue. We must enact a 
right to counsel. The high rate of default judgments is 
intolerable in our justice system. Prosecutors are not being 
held accountable for the claims they bring, and these matters 
are too complex to handle on your own.
    We must put a stop to the low cash forfeitures that make it 
infeasible to hire a lawyer to represent you to get your cash 
back, and we must make sure that low-income individuals have 
the legal help when they need it most. The burden of proof is 
way too low. It does not protect property owners from erroneous 
deprivation of their property.
    And we must boost data tracking and address head on the 
racial disparity in civil forfeiture. We know, and we did 
studies in Philadelphia, that low-income families and 
particularly families of color are disproportionately affected 
by civil forfeiture. This must end, and it will end if we begin 
to eliminate the financial incentive to law enforcement that 
drives persistent abuses.
    I thank you all, and I thank this committee for this 
important work. Let's get it done.
    Mr. Raskin. And thank you, Professor Rulli, for your 
powerful testimony, and thank you for being a credit to law 
professors everywhere with the clinics that you run and the 
work you have been doing in the city of Philadelphia.
    We turn now to Ms. Ahmad. You are now recognized for your 
five minutes of testimony.

STATEMENT OF AAMRA AHMAD, SENIOR POLICY COUNSEL, AMERICAN CIVIL 
                        LIBERTIES UNION

    Ms. Ahmad. Good morning, Chair Raskin, Ranking Member Mace, 
and distinguished members of the subcommittee. My name is Aamra 
Ahmad. I am pleased to be here today to discuss the need for 
federal civil asset forfeiture reform and urge you to pass the 
bipartisan Fifth Amendment Integrity Restoration Act.
    For over 100 years, the ACLU has been our Nation's guardian 
of personal liberties, working to defend and preserve our 
individual rights and liberties. The ACLU believes there are 
three fundamental flaws with federal and state civil asset 
forfeiture laws.
    First, they violate due process and the prohibition against 
excessive fines. Second, they disparately impact people of 
color and low-income people. And third, they create perverse 
profit motives for law enforcement and allow agencies to 
augment their budgets without legislative oversight.
    Civil asset forfeiture has been championed by law 
enforcement officials as a powerful weapon to fight the failed 
war on drugs, seizing the assets of major drug traffickers and 
repurposing those assets to fund law enforcement initiatives. 
It's been profitable.
    Between 2000 and 2014, deposits into DOJ's forfeiture fund 
have increased tenfold from $440 million to $4.5 billion. Far 
greater than the billions in proceeds is the price that people 
pay when their homes, businesses, cars, and cash are unjustly 
seized. Just as the war on drugs disproportionately impacts 
people in communities of color, so does civil asset forfeiture.
    One example is an ACLU case in East Texas, where in 2007, 
police pulled over a biracial couple and their children. When 
police learned they were carrying $6,000 in cash as they were 
en route to buy a new car, they threatened to charge them with 
money laundering and put their children in foster care if they 
did not hand over the cash. The man and woman were never 
arrested or charged with a crime, and the seized assets were 
used to enrich the prosecutors and officers themselves.
    In 2008, the ACLU filed a lawsuit on behalf of the couple 
and other drivers targeted by the scheme. It was discovered 
that between 2006 and 2008, police of East Texas had seized $3 
million from at least 140 people, all people of color.
    Numerous studies show East Texas is not an outlier. 
Thirteen percent of South Carolina's residents are Black men, 
but 65 percent of cash seizures are from Black men. In one 
Florida county, 90 percent of the drivers from whom cash was 
confiscated without arrest were Black or Latino. In New Jersey, 
8 of the 10 cities with the highest number of seizures were 
also the poorest in the state.
    Federal law enforcement does not report data on the race of 
property owners subject to federal forfeiture, but when the 
Washington Post looked at 400 cases that challenged federal 
seizures and got some money back, it found that the majority of 
those people were people of color.
    And when DOJ's Inspector General examined DEA's cash 
seizures, it could confirm that only 34 percent were related to 
a criminal investigation. The report cautioned that when 
forfeitures cannot be linked to criminal activity, ``Law 
enforcement creates the appearance and risks the reality that 
it is more interested in seizing cash than advancing an 
investigation.'' Even the former prosecutors who built DOJ's 
asset forfeiture program in the 1980's have said civil 
forfeiture has run amok and that policing for profit outside of 
the legislative budget process must end.
    For example, DOJ's Equitable Sharing Program serves as a 
loophole for state and local agencies to forum shop and 
sidestep state reforms to the tune of over $6 billion between 
2000 and 2016. Due to the racial disparity and the lack of due 
process, the ACLU believes that federal civil asset forfeiture 
should be abolished.
    In the interim, we also support the following five steps 
that can be taken immediately. First, pass the FAIR Act. It 
would shift the burden of proof to the government, raise the 
standard of proof to clear and convincing evidence, end the 
Equitable Sharing Program, and direct DOJ forfeiture proceeds 
to the general fund, where it will be subject to congressional 
appropriations.
    Second, Congress should end federal administrative 
forfeitures. They lack judicial oversight and are used in 80 to 
98 percent of cases.
    Third, members should conduct oversight of the Equitable 
Sharing Program and demand that DOJ officials prevent purchases 
of military equipment and other forms of wasteful spending.
    Fourth, Congress should give property owners counsel when 
they can't afford it.
    Finally, Congress should establish basic transparency and 
accountability standards by requiring DOJ to report whether 
seizures are related to any criminal investigation and the race 
and ethnicity of property owners.
    Once again, I appreciate your leadership on this issue and 
the opportunity for the ACLU to participate in today's 
important hearing. I look forward to your questions.
    Mr. Raskin. All right. Thank you very much for your 
excellent testimony, Ms. Ahmad.
    And now I am going to recognize myself for five minutes for 
questions.
    First, though, I do want to submit for the record this very 
helpful document that Mr. Alban brought, demonstrating how 
civil forfeiture works at the federal level. And without any 
objections, that will be entered into the record.
    Mr. Raskin. OK. I recognize myself for five minutes for 
questions.
    Now, Ms. Harris, I want to come back to you. What happened 
when your car got seized? Did you have another car?
    Ms. Harris. No, sir. I did not. I ended up in public 
transportation.
    Mr. Raskin. So, how long were you without a car before you 
got your car back? And I know you are one of the lucky ones 
because you found legal representation, but what was the 
interval?
    Ms. Harris. It was probably about a year and a half before 
I would be able to save to purchase another car, nowhere near 
as nice or the value of the one that they took, but it did get 
me to work once I found it.
    Mr. Raskin. I am sorry, but I missed it. How long were you 
going on public transportation without a car?
    Ms. Harris. About a year and a half.
    Mr. Raskin. A year and a half?
    Ms. Harris. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Raskin. And then you got your car back, or how did you 
end up with a new car or a different car?
    Ms. Harris. I was able to get my car back because I was 
then sent to the Goldwater Institute, and they do forfeitures, 
and they do pro bono work. And I was very fortunate to get 
connected with them.
    Mr. Raskin. I got you. So, when you got your car back and 
it was working OK, even though it hadn't been driving for a 
year and a half?
    Ms. Harris. Well, we had to--I had to spend probably about 
$2,000 to get it to ready to be--in order to be drivable and 
what not.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you.
    Mr. Alban, let me come to you. Because I remember when we 
went through this in Maryland, and we dramatically reformed our 
process when we learned of all these outrageous abuses taking 
place. But I think both you and Ms. Ahmad have ventured that 
why do we need civil asset forfeiture?
    Criminal forfeiture says that if we think you are involved 
in, say, drug dealing, you are charged. You are indicted. You 
are prosecuted. If you are found guilty, at that point, the 
criminal forfeiture process kicks in.
    So, you say, well, we don't need law enforcement 
departments just taking people's property from them. Whether it 
is cash or apartments or condos, there is way too much error 
that takes place. The violation of third-party rights is 
terrible, but also, I assume you are raising the rights of even 
the people who might go on to be convicted criminally.
    But do we lose something if we were to abolish civil asset 
forfeiture? And I am thinking specifically of this. I remember 
one officer testified, and he said, well, it is 2 o'clock in 
the morning, and we don't want to bring somebody in and charge 
them and everything. But they are standing on the corner with a 
wad of cash. We just grab the cash, and then they learn their 
lesson, and then we get the money.
    What is wrong with that?
    Mr. Alban. What's wrong with that is that mere suspicion is 
not sufficient to punish someone as though they've committed a 
crime. Under the American criminal justice system, we believe 
that people should be innocent until proven guilty and should 
not be punished until they're proven guilty. And civil 
forfeiture permits law enforcement to seize property from 
people just on that mere suspicion, never actually secure the 
conviction, and say, ``Oh, well, we know that guy is guilty,'' 
even though that's never proven in a court of law.
    Mr. Raskin. And it risks the corruption of both the law 
enforcement officers who are doing the seizing and the 
departments, right?
    Mr. Alban. It does. It creates a strong incentive for those 
law enforcement agencies to devote far more resources to things 
like highway interdiction or airport interdiction, and that 
takes away from the resources that they have to spend 
preventing crime and solving crimes. There's been a number of 
studies that have shown that civil forfeiture is ineffective at 
fighting crime, ineffective at lowering drug use rates, but is 
effective at raising revenue. But that is not a valid reason 
for taking property away from people without a criminal 
conviction.
    Mr. Raskin. But would you talk us through what the Holder 
policy was, how well that worked? Is it time to reinstate it? 
And should it be reinstated the way it was, or should it be 
expanded in some way?
    Mr. Alban. Sure, I'd be happy to. So, the Holder policy 
addressed one specific aspect of the Federal Equitable Sharing 
Program. There are two types of equitable sharing. There are 
adoptive seizures, and there are task force seizures. Task 
force seizures make up about 80 percent of all equitable 
sharing. Adoptive seizures make up about 20 percent.
    The Holder program suspended the use of adoptive seizure. 
So, suspended about 20 percent of the Equitable Sharing Program 
without approval from very high up in the Justice Department. 
And so that prevented state and local agencies from asking 
federal agencies to adopt their seizures and then process them 
through the federal forfeiture system.
    I think it would be excellent to reimplement the Holder 
policy, but frankly, the entire Equitable Sharing Program 
should be suspended. DOJ could do that unilaterally, or 
Congress could simply pass a law making equitable sharing 
something that's not allowed anymore.
    Mr. Raskin. And what about the task force side of it?
    Mr. Alban. So, the task force side was unaddressed by the 
Holder policy. And so the vast majority of equitable sharing 
continued while the Holder policy was in effect. So, it was a 
good first step, but it did not fix the equitable sharing 
loophole.
    Mr. Raskin. But should we look at reforming the task force 
side of it as well?
    Mr. Alban. Yes, absolutely. The entire Equitable Sharing 
Program poses the same problems, poses the same threats to 
federalism, and allows federal--allows local and state law 
enforcement officers to sidestep state law requirements by 
handing their seizures off to the Feds.
    Mr. Raskin. So, it incentivizes an end run around the 
policies that have been adopted by the state governments, 
right?
    Mr. Alban. That's right. And many states have adopted laws 
that are much more protective of property rights than the 
federal forfeiture system or have said that money that's 
received through forfeiture has to go to a school fund or a 
general fund. But the Federal Equitable Sharing Program 
circumvents those requirements and allows those state and local 
law enforcement agencies to directly receive the federal money.
    Mr. Raskin. All right. Well, the state laws are being 
circumvented by federal policy in order to violate the civil 
rights and civil liberties of the people.
    So, thank you. And I am going to turn now to Ms. Mace. You 
are recognized for five minutes.
    Ms. Mace. And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Two things before I start with some questions. First, I 
would like to enter into the record this editorial by the 
Charleston Post and Courier that I quoted from this morning 
about property being seized without bringing charges.
    Mr. Raskin. Without objection.
    Ms. Mace. And then, second, I thought I was on the FAIR Act 
already. Apparently, I am not. So, you can add one more 
Republican to that great bipartisan bill.
    Mr. Raskin. That is very good news. Without any objection 
there, too.
    Ms. Mace. Right. And then, third, I will start with Ms. 
Harris and then go to Mr. Alban.
    Ms. Harris, first of all, I want to thank you for sharing 
your personal story. So, many voices don't have the opportunity 
to share their stories, and it takes courage to do that. And we 
thank you for being here today, going through everything you 
went through from losing your son to losing your vehicle.
    So, my first question goes to you. Were you ever charged 
with a crime in this particular incident?
    Ms. Harris. Not only was I never charged with a crime, I 
was never even accused of a crime, except when they told me if 
I didn't hand over the keys that they could then have held me 
accountable also. Other than that, that's the only thing that 
ever happened.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you.
    I think many Americans would be just surprised and shocked 
to hear that your assets--your car, your house, your cash--
could be seized without ever being charged, let alone convicted 
of a crime.
    What impact did losing your car for that period of time 
have on you, your family, and work?
    Ms. Harris. Yes. Like I said it was in the middle of 
winter. So, I had--I was using public transportation in the 
middle of the winter. And then I had to pretty much grocery 
shop. Everything had to be done on the bus system, and at my 
age, that was not a very pleasant or easy thing to do. But you 
do what you have to.
    Ms. Mace. Right.
    Ms. Harris. And I forgot to state that, which I think is 
very important, is that not only did they take my car, they 
kept my car for five years before they even started any type of 
form of forfeiture acts, and I hadn't heard anything about that 
car for five years. That's a long time.
    Ms. Mace. So, you--technically, you didn't have the vehicle 
for six years?
    Ms. Harris. Yes.
    Ms. Mace. OK, 6, 6 1/2 years without a vehicle. Thank you.
    Ms. Harris. Without my vehicle.
    Ms. Mace. Yes, thank you for sharing that.
    And then I would like to talk to Mr. Alban and talk about 
some of the experiences that you have. And first, thank the 
Goldwater Institute for stepping up and helping you, too, Ms. 
Harris. But can you give some examples, Mr. Alban, of innocent 
activities that someone might have--that your clients or 
potential clients have been involved in that led to their 
property being seized via civil asset forfeiture, where they 
were never charged with a crime?
    Mr. Alban. Absolutely. Usually the activity that people are 
engaged in is traveling, either driving, say, across the 
country, across the state, or flying. I recently represented a 
gentleman from the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans whose name 
was Kermit Warren. He's a metal scrapper and, until the COVID 
pandemic, was the shoeshine man at the Roosevelt Hotel in New 
Orleans.
    He and his son both lost their jobs because of the COVID 
pandemic and were looking to try to provide for themselves by 
expanding their metal scrapping business. To make that 
effective, they needed a second truck. And so Mr. Warren 
located a tow truck that fit his specifications in Ohio. He 
flew to Ohio to inspect that truck, decided it wasn't actually 
quite what they needed, and on his way back was stopped at the 
airport by the DEA and had the $28,180 that he had with him to 
buy the tow truck seized from him.
    That was his entire life savings, and it left him destitute 
for over a year. That seizure happened last November. He 
finally got his money back just before Thanksgiving this year, 
over a year later. He was never charged with any crime, nor was 
his son, and his money has now been fully returned. But his 
life was made miserable for a year because DEA suspected that a 
Black man flying through an airport with $28,000 must be up to 
no good.
    That's just one of many, many examples. I'd be happy to 
provide others, but I don't want to take up your time.
    Ms. Mace. Yes, and how do we disincentivize, de-incentivize 
some of this behavior? What other proposals are out there? We 
have the FAIR Act, but what are some things, small parts that 
would make a big difference in this larger conversation?
    Mr. Alban. Well, I think it's absolutely critical that we 
separate the financial incentive so that law enforcement 
doesn't stand to directly benefit from the seizures that 
they're making. Those DEA officers that stopped Mr. Warren at 
the airport and took money from him, they don't get to put that 
money directly in their pockets, but you better believe they 
get promotions based on how much money they seize. They get 
evaluated based on how much money they seize because they're 
part of the airport interdiction program, and that interdiction 
program exists to take money away from travelers.
    We need to put an end to those sorts of programs, and the 
best way to do that is to make sure that the money that is 
taken through civil forfeiture goes to the general fund and not 
to the DOJ assets forfeiture fund or the Treasury forfeiture 
fund, which are funds that can only be spent by law enforcement 
and are controlled by law enforcement. That's the fundamental 
thing that drives all of this abuse.
    Ms. Mace. And thank you. And I am reminded, Mr. Chairman, 
having this conversation, talking about people using cash, when 
my kids were toddlers, I bought my first minivan for $14,000. 
And I showed up with cash, not even thinking what the 
consequences could be.
    So, thank you for sharing that, and I yield back.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much.
    I knew of another case like this where an older Chinese 
American gentleman had saved up, I think it was around $40,000 
in order to purchase a restaurant, and he was driving to 
Louisiana and got stopped, and the money was seized. It took 
him many years, I think with the help of the Institute for 
Justice, to get the money back.
    All right. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, you are recognized for 
your five minutes.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Chairman, civil asset forfeiture creates perverse 
incentives, as we've heard, for law enforcement agencies that 
stand to benefit financially from increased numbers of 
seizures. After the assets are seized, we heard the property 
may be sold, the proceeds kept, and in some states, law 
enforcement agencies are actually authorized to keep 100 
percent of their forfeiture proceeds, which is a massive 
windfall for law enforcement.
    In the vast majority of jurisdictions, forfeited assets 
don't go into a state's general fund for the well-being of all 
of its citizens, instead the money goes directly to the seizing 
law enforcement agency to spend however they want, and it has 
few or even no strings attached.
    Dr. Alban, can you talk about the best evidence that we 
have that the financial benefits for law enforcement for law 
enforcement created by our laws are a motive behind civil asset 
seizures?
    Mr. Alban. Sure, I'd be happy to discuss that. First of 
all, you can simply look at the time graph of federal civil 
forfeitures over time after the law was passed in the early 
1980's, 1984, the Comprehensive Crime Control Act, permitting 
law enforcement to keep the proceeds of civil forfeitures. 
After that point, civil forfeitures went up dramatically.
    But probably the most salient example that demonstrates how 
this profit incentive distorts law enforcement activity was a 
drug task force that was operating on I-40 outside of 
Nashville. In the drug interdiction world, money and drugs are 
viewed as moving in different directions. The drugs are viewed 
as moving from south to north and from west to east, from 
basically the borders to the population centers in the east 
coast. And the money is viewed as moving in the opposite 
direction, from east to west and from north to south, back to 
the borders where the drugs are coming in from cartels and 
smuggling and that sort of thing.
    On I-40 outside of Nashville, this drug task force, which 
was funded almost entirely by civil forfeiture proceeds, was 
operating 90 percent of the time on the westbound side of the 
freeway. That is the side that the money would be moving on.
    And the local News Channel 5 there investigated it using 
their traffic copters and an undercover investigation and found 
that 90 percent of the time, they were operating on the money 
side of the freeway rather than the drug side of the freeway. 
If you're trying to prevent drug trafficking, you should be 
operating on the drug side of the freeway because you prevent 
the drugs from getting to the east coast, and then there will 
be no money coming back.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Right.
    Mr. Alban. But that was the fundamental problem. There 
would be no money coming back. And if there was no money coming 
back, this drug task force would not be able to exist because 
it was funded almost entirely from civil forfeiture proceeds.
    So, that's just one of the many examples out there.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you. I appreciate that.
    Mr. Chairman, a Washington Post report, which reviewed 
annual reports that are submitted by local and state agencies 
to the Justice Department's Equitable Sharing Program, shows 
how law enforcement agencies and drug task forces spend their 
seizure proceeds. And it found multiple examples of agencies 
that used seizure proceeds to purchase frivolous items, 
including large-scale military-style equipment in small 
communities.
    I would like to ask unanimous consent to submit this report 
to the record.
    Mr. Raskin. Without any objection.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Thank you.
    And Professor Rulli, what tangible steps can the Federal 
Government take right now to remove the profit motive 
associated with civil asset forfeiture? And then I would like 
to ask Dr. Alban, if both of you could answer, if you can 
answer the question about the role that law enforcement plays 
in thwarting civil asset forfeiture reform efforts, even though 
it is clear that they are necessary.
    Mr. Rulli. I'll go first then. This is Lou Rulli. Thank you 
for that question.
    You know, we've seen on the local level how powerfully the 
financial incentive for law enforcement really operates. And in 
Pennsylvania, for example, 100 percent of the funds go directly 
to law enforcement, directly to the people who are making the 
decisions as to whether or not to seek forfeiture.
    And we've watched as the prosecutors' offices grow, and 
they spend money on lots of things that are totally unrelated 
to the safety of our citizens. And so we must direct funds away 
from these forfeiture funds and directly to the Treasury, where 
there is general accountability, where there is much more 
transparency, where we have a sense of exactly the data 
underneath all of these forfeitures.
    What are the forfeitures for? Who is being impacted by 
these forfeitures? How is the money being spent? Are people 
being charged with a crime or not? And certainly, our 
experience on the local level has really confirmed all of the 
things that have been discussed here today, that reform is so 
desperately needed.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. And Mr. Chairman, would it be OK if 
the other question was answered quickly?
    Mr. Raskin. Yes, was that addressed to Ms. Ahmad?
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. Mr. Alban. Professor Alban.
    Mr. Raskin. Mr. Alban, yes.
    Mr. Alban. Yes, I'd be happy to address that. Law 
enforcement likes to say that they are only enforcing the laws 
and they don't make the laws. But the dirty little secret of 
forfeiture reform is the only entity opposed to forfeiture 
reform is law enforcement, and it's a powerful lobby.
    I have personal experience with reform efforts in states 
like Missouri, where there has been widespread support--
widespread bipartisan support for forfeiture reform, 
eliminating the equitable sharing loophole, and prosecutors and 
officials from St. Charles County, which profits substantially 
from civil forfeiture on the interstate there, come in and they 
lobby key legislators. And you know, basically say you don't 
want to look soft on crime. You're going to be taking money out 
of--out of law enforcement's pockets, and we're going to make 
you pay for that politically.
    And that sort of process repeats itself all around the 
country when there are forfeiture reform efforts. They are 
almost always bipartisan. They are almost always supported 
nearly unanimously, if not unanimously. And yet law enforcement 
opposes these reform efforts because they view it as taking 
money out of their pockets.
    And that is the primary obstacle that folks who want to 
reform civil forfeiture law face, that law enforcement is a 
powerful lobby. That it is able to affect how things happen in 
the judiciary process and in judicial committees where these 
bills are typically before. They can get a bill so that it's 
not heard. It's simply tabled.
    And you have bills with widespread support that end up 
moving nowhere because of opposition from law enforcement.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you. Thank you. The gentlelady's time has 
expired.
    Ms. Wasserman Schultz. [Inaudible].
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much. Mr. Biggs, you are now 
recognized for your five minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Biggs. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    I am grateful that you are having this hearing. This is an 
important topic, and Mr. Alban has kind of connected up, as 
some of you have, the intersection between state law and 
federal law on civil asset forfeiture.
    Civil asset forfeiture laws infringe upon Americans' due 
process and property rights. Civil forfeiture has been used by 
state and federal officials to confiscate innocent Americans' 
property. And this is a problem, OK? So, I am going to get off 
my script here for a second because I used to be a prosecutor, 
and we actually carpooled. I carpooled with a group of 
prosecutors, and one of our prosecutors was a civil asset 
forfeiture attorney.
    And he would tell us of cases, and we would say, ``How can 
you take this person's property?'' I mean, first of all, they 
have never been--you didn't even charge them. They were never 
charged with a crime.
    Second of all, there is the standard of proof is so low. 
How can that be? But that was the state law in Arizona. And so 
Arizona has actually done some reform, much needed, long 
overdue reform.
    So, I want to ask--I want to, if I can, deconstruct or 
delink for just a minute, Mr. Alban. My question is for you 
initially, and then if you are able to answer this question. 
How extensive is the federal civil asset forfeiture system? I 
want to know how much money or the value of the assets that we 
are seizing in our federal police apparatus, our prosecutorial 
apparatus every year? Do we know?
    Mr. Alban. It varies by year, Congressman. It's 
approximately $2 billion to $3 billion in recent years. From 
2000 to 2019, of that $69 billion figure that I mentioned 
earlier, $45.7 billion of that went into federal forfeiture 
funds. So, it was forfeited by federal agencies or through 
federal equitable sharing.
    Mr. Biggs. And so when we look at this, the argument from 
my police officer friends is that we are using it to curtail 
crime. Is there any evidence, is there any scientific data--I 
shouldn't say scientific, but any statistical data that 
indicates that we have seen the reduction in crime in certain 
areas because of the civil asset forfeiture laws?
    Mr. Alban. There is not. In fact, the studies indicate the 
opposite. A study that was done on New Mexico, which abolished 
civil forfeiture in 2015, found that after civil forfeiture was 
abolished, there was no increase in crime rates both in New 
Mexico and New Mexico compared to neighboring counties of other 
states.
    Mr. Biggs. Can you share that study with members of the 
committee?
    Mr. Alban. Absolutely. It's in our ``Policing for Profit'' 
report. We also have two other reports that were done looking, 
one, at federal equitable sharing data and, two, at the data 
from five states that made data available, comparing forfeiture 
rates to crime rates. Found no correlation in terms of 
increases in forfeiture reducing crime or reducing drug use.
    Mr. Biggs. So, there may be some other variables, 
independent variables that are affecting crime rates is what 
you are suggesting?
    Mr. Alban. Lots of other independent variables affect crime 
rates, but civil forfeiture is not one of them.
    Mr. Biggs. OK. So, the other--the other argument is that 
victims--our system is not designed--you know, biblical systems 
were designed to restore victims. Our system doesn't do that. 
We do it very inefficiently. We tend to punish first and 
reimburse victims last.
    What is the result here? Do we have any data indicating 
that civil asset forfeiture is going to benefit or restore 
victims and make them whole where possible?
    Mr. Alban. The evidence that we have, Congressman, is that 
a teeny-tiny percentage of all federal forfeiture procedures--
--
    Mr. Biggs. What would that be? ``Teeny-tiny'' doesn't 
compute for me. I need to know what the number is.
    Mr. Alban. I'll have to get back to you on the specific 
number, but I believe it's around 5 or 6 percent.
    Mr. Biggs. OK. And so if you can get that for us, that 
would be helpful.
    I think that the first thing--and the other thing is, as we 
have talked about, the standard of proof. The number of cases 
that don't even get litigated here because the value, what is 
the average value, something like $1,300, of assets seized. The 
cost to litigate that is at least twice that. In my own 
experience, it would cost you far more than you would get. Is 
that accurate?
    Mr. Alban. Yes. At the state level, the median forfeiture 
is about $1,000.
    Mr. Biggs. What is it at the federal level?
    Mr. Alban. At the federal level, for DOJ agencies, it's 
$12,090. And for Treasury agencies, it's about $7,300.
    Mr. Biggs. Thank you. My time has expired.
    Mr. Chairman, thank you for introducing this legislation. 
Thanks for having this hearing today. Appreciate it.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you for your questioning, Mr. Biggs. It 
is appreciated.
    And Ms. Kelly, I come to you for your five minutes.
    Ms. Kelly. Thank you, Chairman Raskin and Ranking Member 
Mace, for holding this very important hearing.
    The protection of due process is central to our justice 
system. However, the current process of civil forfeiture 
violates this right and disproportionately, as we have heard, 
affects people of color. A policy that was meant to target drug 
kingpins and criminal organizations has instead been used by 
police departments as an extra revenue stream.
    Targeting people on their way to buy a car with money they 
have saved or someone related to a person that has committed a 
misdemeanor is simply unacceptable. Congress passed the Civil 
Assets Forfeiture Reform Act, or CAFRA, in 2000 with the intent 
of implementing due process protections for innocent people 
facing forfeitures. Unfortunately, as the last 20 years of 
civil asset forfeiture regimes have proven, CAFRA has not 
worked.
    Ms. Ahmad, I would like to start with you. As I mentioned, 
CAFRA was intended to provide due process protections for 
individuals facing civil asset forfeitures, but such 
protections have not happened in a meaningful way. How has 
CAFRA affected the due process rights of individuals whose 
assets have been seized by law enforcement?
    Ms. Ahmad. Sure. Well, I think it's helpful to compare 
civil forfeiture to criminal forfeiture and what happens in 
criminal court. Under criminal forfeiture, a person has the 
presumption of innocence. They have to be--the government has 
the burden of proving a person guilty beyond a reasonable 
doubt.
    But in civil court, we have this archaic legal fiction that 
a piece of property can be a defendant in a case. So, we have 
cases of United States v. $22,000. And because it's a piece of 
property, it doesn't have rights. It doesn't have a right to 
counsel. It doesn't have the presumption of innocence. The 
property is presumed guilty. The individual has to prove their 
innocence, and under CAFRA, they have to prove their innocence.
    So, the kind of changes that we need for property owners is 
to--is to put the burden of proof on the government, to raise 
the burden of proof from preponderance of the evidence. Right 
now, the government just has to prove a nexus to the crime, 
between the property and the crime by a preponderance of the 
evidence. That should be raised to clear and convincing 
evidence. And these changes would definitely level the playing 
field.
    Ms. Kelly. Has CAFRA even reduced civil asset forfeiture 
abuse since its passage?
    Ms. Ahmad. Actually, since CAFRA, the Department of 
Treasury and the DOJ's asset forfeiture program have still been 
pulling in billions of dollars, even more than before CAFRA was 
passed. It's been 20 years, and the budgets just keep growing. 
The asset forfeiture funds and proceeds keep growing.
    Ms. Kelly. Thank you.
    Mr. Alban, I would like to bring you in. Based on what we 
have heard today, it seems clear that CAFRA has not fulfilled 
its intended purpose. But I am curious to know whether CAFRA 
has harmed any of the people it was designed to protect. Can 
you speak to some of the unintended consequences?
    Mr. Alban. Certainly. CAFRA was watered down quite 
dramatically from its proposed version to the version that was 
ultimately passed. There were a handful of good reforms within 
CAFRA, for instance, raising the burden of proof from probable 
cause to a preponderance of the evidence. But by and large, 
CAFRA did not make a major impact on the federal forfeiture 
system, and so people continued to be abused by federal 
forfeiture after CAFRA.
    Ms. Kelly. And how has the federal civil asset forfeiture 
and equitable sharing practices evolved since CAFRA's passage 
in 2000?
    Mr. Alban. Well, the data show that there have been 
increases in the amount of money brought in through both the 
federal forfeiture programs and the equitable sharing programs. 
There have been substantial increases through 2015 or 2016. 
Federal forfeiture seems to have peaked around those years. 
There's been a slight decline since then, but CAFRA does not 
seem to have slowed the increase of forfeitures at the federal 
level.
    Ms. Kelly. And what are your top one or two reforms that 
you would recommend?
    Mr. Alban. I'd say the top three reforms that should be 
passed would be eliminating the profit incentive by directing 
all federal forfeiture proceeds to the general fund; two, 
eliminate equitable sharing so that there's no loophole for 
state and local governments to evade--state and local law 
enforcement agencies to evade their own state laws; and three, 
eliminate administrative forfeiture, which stacks the deck 
against property owners and produces this incredibly complex 
and byzantine system that is impossible for someone to navigate 
without an attorney and, frankly, many attorneys find very 
difficult to navigate.
    Ms. Kelly. Thank you to the witnesses.
    And my time is up. Thank you.
    Mr. Raskin. Ms. Kelly, thank you for your questioning.
    And before I come to Mr. Sessions, I just want to, without 
objection, Congressman Clyde of Georgia will be permitted to 
join the hearing and be recognized for the purpose of 
questioning the witnesses. Without any objection.
    So, Mr. Clyde, welcome. And I now recognize you, Mr. 
Sessions, for your five minutes.
    Mr. Sessions. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.
    And to our panel, we appreciate this. I think this--I join 
my colleagues in saying--is an area that not only is very 
interesting but must--for civil liberties of our citizens, must 
be looked at again.
    My innocence in looking at this is that I would have 
assumed that if you take something from someone, you would have 
followed up with a process. That you would have required 
yourself, your legal team--whether it is a police officer or 
sheriff, federal agent--that they would have had a process that 
they must conform themselves to within a timeframe. It is a 
taking. Maybe you don't charge them with something. Then if you 
go through that process, you have to return the money.
    Talk to me about this angle of the Federal Government. 
Generally speaking, do they just as they did at the airport in 
the example you gave, Mr. Alban, where the federal agencies--I 
don't know what those were, U.S. Marshals or just DEA, but I 
know that they have combined task forces. What is their process 
that they are required to follow by the law?
    Mr. Alban. Sure. I'd be happy to address that.
    So, under CAFRA, the federal forfeiture statute that we 
were just discussing, when federal law enforcement like DEA 
seize property from someone, they're supposed to give that 
person a receipt at the time of the seizure. And then, within 
60 days, they are supposed to followup with what's called a 
CAFRA notice, or a notice of intended forfeiture.
    So, about two months after the seizure, the property owner 
should receive in the mail a notice saying that the agency is 
intending to forfeit their property. At that point, the 
property owner has four options. By the way, this is all 
outlined in our federal forfeiture infographic.
    At that point, the property owner has four options. One is 
to file an administrative petition and let the administrative 
agency decide the case. One is to file a judicial claim and try 
to go to court. And then the other two options are basically 
give up or negotiate some sort of settlement.
    The property owner has to do those first two actions within 
30 or 35 days, and then once they file a claim with the agency, 
then the Federal Government has another 90 days to file a civil 
forfeiture complaint. So, in a typical forfeiture case where 
someone is represented by counsel and is advised to file a 
judicial claim making the government take the case to court, if 
you add up those time periods--60 days plus 30 days plus 180 
days--you end up about six months after the seizure before the 
Federal Government even files the initial civil forfeiture 
complaint.
    And that, of course, is what starts the forfeiture case 
itself. So, it can be many years after that that the person is 
able to get their property back.
    Those are the processes that are supposed to be followed. 
They are not always followed. The person doesn't always receive 
the notice within 60 days. Sometimes agencies seize property, 
hold onto it for years, and never bother to process it through 
the forfeiture system.
    Mr. Sessions. So, it seems like to me that we should spend 
time, notwithstanding we are trying to stop things that are 
egregious and wrong, that we should streamline the system to at 
least make sure that perhaps the burden is on them up front, 
meaning whoever the agency was that had the taking, that they 
had to prove cause, that they had to show some jurisdiction 
about why they got that.
    And you are saying that is at the back part of that 
process?
    Mr. Alban. That's right. That's one of the major 
inadequacies of the federal forfeiture system is that there is 
no prompt procedure hearing for someone to be able to shortly 
after the seizure contest the legitimacy of the seizure. What 
if the government just got the wrong person or the wrong bank 
account or the person has all receipts with them and can easily 
show that they just withdrew this money from the bank and are 
going on a trip to buy, you know, a new car or something like 
that.
    Those things can be easily shown at an early stage and can 
at least allow someone whose car is seized, for instance, to 
maintain possession of that car while the forfeiture proceeding 
continues. But the federal forfeiture system doesn't have that, 
and that means even innocent people, people who ultimately 
prevail in their federal forfeiture proceeding, can go years 
without their property.
    And of course, that's tremendously harmful to them. If 
you're a car owner, you probably need to get a new car while 
that's going on. That puts a substantial burden on property 
owners, and they shouldn't have that burden.
    Mr. Sessions. Do you find that these forfeitures, that 
these federal agencies then go and speak with and do an 
investigation like perhaps with the IRS to find out whether 
their justification that they took of that I suppose would be a 
larger amount, not a smaller amount? Do they involve then 
federal agencies, or do they just do their own investigation, 
what I would call a prima facie--``Well, we don't know where 
you got it. So, we took it.''
    Do they then come back and where there is a process, they 
involve other federal agencies like the IRS?
    Mr. Alban. It varies. In some instances, it looks like no 
additional investigation was done once the seizure happened. In 
a few other instances, I'm aware of the U.S. Marshal Service, 
on behalf of U.S. attorney's offices, conducting additional 
investigation. I'm aware of different agencies reaching out to 
each other as part of investigations.
    But it seems like the most common practice is once we've 
done a seizure, there's no need for additional followup. If you 
had a whole bunch of money and you were flying, that's prima 
facie evidence of you were up to no good, and we're just going 
to keep the money based on that.
    Mr. Sessions. Could we have one more question, please, Mr. 
Chairman?
    Mr. Raskin. Please.
    Mr. Sessions. Is there a what I would call an area of the 
country, a federal area where they seemingly do process maybe 
at a fair or equitable balance, where either by one of the U.S. 
attorneys or however the administrative procedure? Is the 
Federal Government good at some point where they do a better 
job, where they take this seriously, as opposed to maybe 
others? Is there a best practice area?
    Mr. Raskin. The gentleman may answer the question.
    Mr. Alban. There's not a specific region that's doing 
better than another region. But I will say that a large number 
of forfeitures are dropped between when the seizing agency 
seizes it, the property owner files a claim, which requires it 
to go to court.
    That requires the seizing agency to transfer the case to 
the U.S. attorney's office. And the U.S. attorney's office has 
to then evaluate whether that case is worth pursuing as a civil 
forfeiture. And it's at that point that there seems to be some 
adult supervision. Some U.S. attorney's offices are better than 
others. But some U.S. attorney's offices will look at those 
seizures more closely and will, at times, decline to file a 
forfeiture action, which ultimately means that the person's 
property is returned.
    Now that happens 7 or 8 months later----
    Mr. Sessions. Right.
    Mr. Alban [continuing]. But it's----
    Mr. Sessions. Well, and I am sorry about, Mr. Chairman. 
Thank you for allowing me to ask that question, and I 
appreciate our witnesses today of the information they brought 
us.
    Thank you.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you, Mr. Sessions. And I now recognize 
the gentlelady from the District of Columbia, Ms. Norton, for 
her five minutes of questioning.
    Ms. Norton. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    This is a very revealing and important hearing. We have 
heard some of the specifics. I am interested in how asset 
forfeiture disproportionately affects communities and 
individuals of color, and that is what my questions will go to. 
We have heard some of that about from Philadelphia, but we find 
it in states all over the United States. Las Vegas, Oklahoma, 
California--I am amazed at how widespread this is.
    Ms. Ahmad, the ACLU of California found that more than 85 
percent of equitable sharing payments in the state went to 
police agencies serving majority-minority communities. Now that 
is what interested me right there. What do you believe explains 
the disproportionate impact of civil asset forfeiture on 
communities of color?
    Ms. Ahmad. Sure. Well, thank you for your question.
    I will point out that that trend that you have honed in on 
in California, as you indicated, around the country, in New 
Jersey, the poorest counties are the ones that are most 
targeted. That's not unusual at all. It's a common occurrence.
    What accounts for that is concerns about racial bias in 
policing. That's a problem throughout the system. The war on 
drugs is really what is fueling the asset forfeiture process. 
It is seen as a tool to fight the drug war. But many of the 
tools that are used in the drug war have been unsuccessful and 
ineffective, and they have a trend of disparately impacting 
communities of color and also poor communities.
    Ms. Norton. Well, if the high percentage of forfeitures 
involving Black and Latino communities reflect excessive 
targeting of those communities by law enforcement, how can we 
hope to craft reforms--because that is what we are interested 
in in this committee--that will reduce the disparate impact of 
these practices?
    Ms. Ahmad. We need oversight, and we need accountability, 
and we need transparency.
    Ms. Norton. Oversight at the state level or at the federal 
level?
    Ms. Ahmad. At the state and the federal level. Because 
those numbers that you mentioned about California, those were 
all federal dollars that were taken through the Equitable 
Sharing Program, the Department of Justice's Equitable Sharing 
Program, and sent to California agencies that were policing 
communities of color.
    So, at the federal level, first of all, there needs to be 
reporting about the race of people, the race and ethnicity of 
people who are subject to seizures. We need more information. 
The information we have so far is from independent 
investigations by organizations like the ACLU or journalists 
like the Greenville News in South Carolina, who are collecting 
this data.
    So, we need that information, and Congress can mandate that 
that information be reported. We also need information about 
the effectiveness of these seizures. So, for example, in my 
written testimony, I talk about a 2017 report from the 
Inspector General's office at the DOJ that reviewed very 
carefully a number of DEA seizures and found that the DEA--and 
probably other federal agencies--does not track whether 
seizures are related to a criminal investigation or 
prosecution.
    And the Inspector General, as I said earlier in my 
statement, noted that when that happens, there is a question as 
to whether this is really crime fighting or about seizing 
assets. So, if we have that information and that transparency, 
that would give Congress the ability to conduct that oversight.
    We also need due process. So, right now, law enforcement is 
the judge and the jury and the prosecutor when assets are 
seized. Law enforcement gets to decide whether there's probable 
cause to seize the asset in the first place, and then no one 
else participates in the system. The property owner can't 
participate in the system for many months.
    There should be an opportunity to--sorry.
    Ms. Norton. I have never heard of such a system in this 
country. I did have one more question, though, for Professor 
Rulli.
    After Philadelphia--I am very interested in reform and 
whether it can take place and what happens. After Philadelphia 
reformed its civil asset forfeiture practices, did you see a 
shift in how communities of color were targeted? Professor 
Rulli?
    Mr. Rulli. Well, there are many things that are happening, 
many moving parts here. And this is a complex question, and I 
thank you for that question.
    First, let me just say that we cannot separate civil 
forfeiture from criminal justice reform that's ongoing, and 
there's a direct relationship here that we need to examine, and 
we need the data, as has already been reported.
    I'd also point out that in minority communities, many 
families are unbanked or underbanked, meaning that they are 
carrying cash because that is the way that they are able to 
trans--you know, deal with the various needs that they may 
have. And so the suspicion that the mere carrying of cash is 
somehow illegal or related to drugs is a fundamental issue that 
is targeted really in low-income and minority communities. We 
have seen this throughout Pennsylvania, but particularly in our 
urban centers like Philadelphia.
    Now there have been reforms, but as you've already heard, 
there were much more extensive reforms originally planned. I 
testified in the Senate Judiciary Committee that would have 
much more greatly revamped our state laws, but behind my 
testimony was the testimony of elected district attorneys from 
around the state that brought a very powerful lobby to really 
diminish the reforms that could have taken place.
    Nonetheless, we have had reforms. We have a new district 
attorney who has greatly curtailed civil forfeiture. The press 
has spotlighted the abuses of forfeiture and its impact on low-
income and minority communities. The Institute for Justice 
brought litigation in collaboration with local folks that was 
very successful.
    Our Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued an excessive fines 
decision that was critical, and we haven't talked about 
excessive fines protection, but that's really another area that 
is underutilized. And we've had, as I said, some changes to our 
Pennsylvania law, like elevating the burden of proof to clear 
and convincing evidence.
    Ms. Norton. Thank you.
    Mr. Rulli. So, all of those things are helping, but the 
reality is that this is a problem largely in urban centers, 
largely in low-income and minority communities.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you. The gentlelady's time has expired. I 
now recognize Mr. Clyde for his five minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Clyde. Thank you, Chairman Raskin and Ranking Member 
Mace, for allowing me to join the subcommittee today to discuss 
this issue that is very much a personal interest of mine, 
making much-needed reforms to civil asset forfeiture 
proceedings to protect the due process rights of individuals.
    I say it is a personal interest because I, myself, was a 
victim of civil asset forfeiture. I had my asset seized by the 
Internal Revenue Service in 2013, over $940,000, without 
warning and without ever being charged with a crime. And I 
think we have heard that a lot today--without ever being 
charged with a crime.
    So, how on earth does the Internal Revenue Service or any 
other government agency have the power to seize one's property 
without charging a person with a crime? It should not. But the 
IRS had been wrongfully confiscating money from individuals and 
small business owners across the country through civil asset 
forfeiture. Specifically, they were accusing people of 
structuring their legally earned cash bank deposits, and that 
is exactly what they did to me.
    In my case, the Internal Revenue Service offered me a deal 
to give back two-thirds of the $940,000 of my legally earned 
money if I would forfeit one-third to them as a penalty. They 
wanted me to voluntarily forfeit $325,000.
    Even though they admitted in writing that all the money was 
legally earned and properly reported, in writing. This was 
nothing short of extortion, and I refused. They then threatened 
me with criminal prosecution to get a civil monetary 
settlement, which is a violation of legal ethics. And again, I 
refused because I had done nothing wrong.
    Long story short, I fought the Internal Revenue Service in 
court and eventually had my money returned, but it cost me 
$150,000. Unfortunately, too many Americans do not have the 
ability or the resources to take on the government, especially 
the Internal Revenue Service, and they wound up losing their 
businesses and livelihoods.
    But I couldn't stop there. So, I found myself on the 
opposite side of this dais back in 2015. And there was a 
gentleman from the Institute for Justice, Rob Johnson, that sat 
right beside me testifying against the Internal Revenue Service 
and their corrupt methods in a congressional hearing. My 
testimony before Congress resulted in the introduction of and 
the eventual enactment of the Clyde-Hirsch-Sowers RESPECT Act, 
a bill that ensured individuals and small businesses were 
protected from unlawful cash seizures by the Internal Revenue 
Service over structuring.
    Those protections were a great start, and I am thrilled to 
be here to learn more about how we can further reform our civil 
asset forfeiture laws so that we are protecting the due process 
rights of all Americans from being trampled on by all federal 
agencies, not just the Internal Revenue Service. In fact, I was 
excited to learn about the chairman's bill when he introduced 
it with Representative Walberg, the FAIR Act, and I 
wholeheartedly support its goals and policies.
    Civil asset forfeiture knows no partisan bounds, no ethnic 
bounds, as no person is immune to it, none. We can and we must 
do better, and so I wanted to use this opportunity to commend 
the chair's work on this bill and for holding today's hearing 
to shine a light on the perverse incentives of federal 
forfeiture proceedings and the need to strengthen civil 
liberties.
    One aspect I am particularly interested in working on, 
which the FAIR Act looks to do, is bolstering the reporting 
requirements and data tracking of assets seized so that we can 
know whether civil forfeiture is being applied fairly to all 
citizens. In fact, Mr. Rulli brought up the very issue of the 
need for more transparency in his submitted testimony, and I 
find this important, Mr. Chairman, because eventually I would 
like to see every individual wronged by civil asset forfeiture 
abuses made whole again. And we must have a better reporting 
system to make that happen, I believe.
    So, Mr. Rulli, a question for you. Recognizing that we need 
better data and reporting to right the wrongs moving forward, 
is there an avenue by which we could simultaneously look to 
retroactively right these wrongs?
    While I was fortunate to get my assets back, too many 
people have thrown up their hands and succumbed to the abuse. 
They just want it to go away. That is all they want.
    And I realize there is no silver bullet to achieve my 
desired outcome, but is there any instrument you see that we 
could--wherein we could help these individuals? Thank you.
    Mr. Rulli. Thank you for that question and for your 
testimony here, and it's so powerful.
    And I would just add that so many of the clients we've had 
were in similar situations where prosecutors said, well, we'll 
give you 50 percent back, but we're keeping 50 percent. Really 
extortion.
    Mr. Clyde. Right.
    Mr. Rulli. Even though there was no legal basis for the 
taking of that property. And that's why transparency and data 
is so important. We have to provide remedies for those whose 
property has been taken, and we have to know exactly what is 
happening.
    I get calls all the time from reporters saying they're 
having difficulty getting access to the data. That's certainly 
at the state level, and that requires right to know requests, 
Freedom of Information requests, great delay, great objections, 
but without real basis.
    And so, yes, I think the FAIR Act can take a major step 
forward in providing requirements that are carefully tailored 
to the abuses that we have seen so that we can get on top of 
the information we need not only to prevent the future abuses, 
but to determine who's been abused, who's had their property 
wrongfully taken, and how we can provide a remedy for them.
    This is a very important part of this legislation, and I 
support it completely.
    Mr. Raskin. All right.
    Mr. Clyde. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If you may, I would 
certainly appreciate the opportunity to work with you on that, 
on that issue, if you----
    Mr. Raskin. By all means. Thank you for raising that. Thank 
you for your participation, Mr. Clyde. We welcome it, and we 
thank you for your excellent and revealing comments today.
    I was thinking about when you were talking about the 
shakedown, the extortion of one third of your money when you 
hadn't done anything wrong, and they were conceding it. St. 
Augustine once said that government without justice becomes 
just a band of robbers.
    Mr. Clyde. That is right.
    Mr. Raskin. And we don't want the police to be mimicking 
the tactics of the worst thieves on the street. So, thank you 
very much for your participation.
    Come now to Ms. Tlaib for your five minutes of questioning.
    Ms. Tlaib. Thank you so much, Chairman Raskin.
    And I really appreciate, Ms. Harris, you helping put a 
human face behind much of that is being discussed in this 
committee and very, very important hearing.
    You know, civil asset forfeiture has been a major issue in 
my district. In 2017 alone, 400 of my residents without being 
charged with a crime, like my colleague, lost their vehicles to 
Wayne County's Operation Push-Off. They didn't have the kind of 
resources that some of my colleagues have here. I mean, this is 
life-changing for them.
    The operation targeted disadvantaged communities, involved 
officers stopping individuals and seizing vehicles if they 
suspected, not proved, suspected that they have been involved 
in a crime. I find it extremely outrageous. A vehicle can be a 
lifeline for so many of my residents.
    Individuals who wanted to challenge these forfeitures could 
expect the process to take months or even years. Naturally, 
they could also pay $900 ``settlement fee,'' basically, a 
legalized bribe, in my view, for the return of their property. 
And of course, all of the proceeds went straight to the police 
department. If anyone else was doing this, it would be called 
extortion.
    The fact that there are studies now that show that civil 
asset forfeiture does not significantly reduce crime or improve 
policing capabilities in our country. A recent study by the 
Institute for Justice that looked at data from five states, 
including my own, found ``no evidence that forfeiture proceeds 
helped police fight crime, whether in terms of solving more 
crimes or reducing drug use.''
    This table, Mr. Alban, from the report shows civil asset 
forfeiture has no significant impact on drug use. Can you 
quickly summarize this table and its meaning for my colleagues 
on the effectiveness of civil asset forfeiture?
    Mr. Alban. Sure. So, this study compared the data, federal 
data on illicit drug use and specific categories of drug use, 
including marijuana, nonmedical prescription drugs, cocaine, 
and found there was no correlation between increases or 
decreases in the use of civil forfeiture and increases or 
decreases in drug use rates of the various categories depicted 
in that table.
    Ms. Tlaib. And the next table, if you look right here, the 
next table shows the effect of forfeiture on crime clearances, 
or the number of crimes solved by police. Can you briefly walk 
us through this table and its meaning?
    Mr. Alban. Sure. So, the top-level takeaway is that there 
was no associated correlation between increases or decreases in 
the use of civil forfeiture and on crime. However, there was an 
inverse relationship between crime clearance rates and the use 
of civil forfeiture.
    And so what this table shows is that when you divert law 
enforcement priorities to things like highway interdiction or 
community interdiction programs, where you're stopping people 
on the streets and taking away their money, instead of actually 
solving violent crimes, you end up with lower crime clearance 
rates, which should not be a goal.
    Ms. Tlaib. Well, thank you for that.
    Ms. Ahmad, I would like to conclude with your thoughts. On 
this greater conversation, and it has been a conversation, 
around policing in our country and reform, in your view, what 
does the fact that increased revenues from civil asset 
forfeiture don't actually improve crime rates or drug use tell 
us about the need for civil forfeiture reform?
    Ms. Ahmad. Thank you for the question.
    Right. I agree. It tells us that there's a need for civil 
asset forfeiture reform, that crime rates are not decreasing. 
And again, it brings us back to this is about process. It's 
about due process. It's about involving a judge in the process 
so that there is a neutral arbiter. But it is also about 
oversight. It is about accountability.
    If a town in Georgia of 30,000 spends over $200,000 on an 
armored truck based on using federal equitable sharing 
proceeds, the question is, were stakeholders in the community 
involved? This was all done behind a Black box, and it wasn't 
learned of until after the purchase was made. Others in the 
community may have wanted to spend that money differently.
    So, if we can bring transparency to the process and if we 
can remove the profit motive by directing proceeds to a general 
fund that is controlled by a legislative body in a public and 
open manner, that would make a tremendous difference.
    Ms. Tlaib. Yes, and I think a lot of us, and that is 
something very much my colleagues and I all agree about is 
transparency. And so, again, thank you so much for being part 
of this process.
    And thank you again to Ms. Harris, who shared her story. I 
think it is really important to remember that these are 
families and folks behind all of these processes, and if we 
don't get it right, it really is a life-altering change for 
them.
    Thank you so much, and I yield.
    Mr. Raskin. Ms. Tlaib, thank you so much.
    Ms. Pressley, if you are out there, you are recognized for 
your five minutes? It looks like she had--oh, there you go. Ms. 
Pressley?
    Ms. Pressley. Thank you, Chairman Raskin, for convening 
today's hearing.
    Civil asset forfeiture laws have been weaponized by police 
and prosecutors and disproportionately targeted against Black 
and brown communities for far too long. These policies amount 
to little more than legalized theft, and they are abused to 
increase police budgets and to dole out bonuses. Without 
reform, civil asset forfeiture laws will continue to exact hurt 
and harm at the expense of innocent people all across our 
country.
    And the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the state I call 
home, is certainly no exception. In 2018, Massachusetts made 
$36 million in revenue from civil asset forfeitures because it 
had an extremely low standard for seizure. The state has little 
transparency on who it is taking money and property from and 
even less accountability to ensure wrongful seizures are 
quickly returned.
    Ms. Harris, unfortunately, you know this all too well. We 
all appreciate your willingness to share your story on how your 
car, your only possession during the time when you were living 
in a shelter, was seized by the police and impounded for five 
years. It breaks my heart to learn about the hardships and 
trauma that you experienced. At the same time, my heart swells 
at your resiliency and your ability, as Chairman Elijah 
Cummings so often said, to turn your pain into purpose.
    Ms. Harris, I want to give you an opportunity to share 
anything about your experience that you would like to add to 
your opening remarks, such as what was going through your mind 
in real time when this happened.
    Ms. Harris. I was alone--can you hear me?
    Ms. Pressley. Yes.
    Ms. Harris. OK. My voice gets low sometimes. And I just 
felt like I didn't have any resources. I didn't have any money. 
So, nobody wanted to talk to me.
    And I just really thought that the car was just gone 
because I see it all the time in my community. This is not 
unusual, and everyone was just telling me that it's a loss, 
it's a loss.
    I was going through other things at the time, so I just 
moved on to what was next, and that was--that was unemployment, 
finding a place to live, you know, those things that were more 
important. And like I said, I already just said, OK, that's 
gone. Because this is what happens all the time where I live 
at. It's not unusual, you know, for that to happen.
    Ms. Pressley. And thank you for that. And if you can tell 
us, what did it mean to have your car returned to you after you 
had written it off as gone for more than five years? What was 
that moment like, and in what ways did that change and improve 
your life?
    Ms. Harris. Well, it affected me because my son Trevice was 
murdered. Being able to get that car back and to give it to his 
oldest daughter who had just graduated high school and started 
college was tremendous, and it left a legacy for Trevice for 
his daughter to have something by him. So, it was tremendous. 
It was uplifting.
    And it shows not only Kenai, his daughter, but in our 
community sometimes it's just like really hard to see that the 
law works for us. And for that to come back and to get that 
car, it let my granddaughters know that this system, we are 
included in this system, and it does work when people treat us 
fairly and work it.
    Ms. Pressley. That is right.
    Ms. Harris. So, she was--so she was able to see that the 
law does work when somebody puts in the effort to make it 
happen. So, and that was something that was big for us.
    Ms. Pressley. Thank you. Well, you are modeling the fact 
that the arc of justice has to be--we have to bend it. And so, 
but I thank you so much for sharing your story. And although it 
is one that is based in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the 
policy violence of civil forfeiture is nationwide, as evidenced 
by the testimony that we have heard here today.
    Professor Rulli, as the director of a law school clinic 
working on civil asset forfeiture, how does the loss of a home 
or car or even a few hundred dollars affect the lives of your 
clients?
    Mr. Rulli. Thank you for that question.
    It's devastating. It is so painful. It really just renders 
family--it tears families apart. The thought of being put on 
the street, most of our clients, their homes were all paid up. 
Many of them were of elderly age and were facing difficult 
health problems.
    And to have this kind of pressure on them, the loss of 
their home or of their cars, which they needed for medical 
appointments, they needed for all kinds of things that were 
critical to their well-being, just was inflicting enormous 
pain. And to think that their own government was doing it to 
them when they had done nothing wrong was----
    Ms. Pressley. That is right. And Professor Rulli, to that 
point, so this injustice that they experienced happened very 
quickly, but the process to have their belongings returned to 
them was much more slow. Could you just speak to that, just the 
challenges of navigating that process in order to have one's 
property returned?
    Mr. Rulli. Yes. It is, as you've heard today, it's a very 
complex process. It's a very lengthy process.
    The example that I gave of the piggybank, for example, 
which was just $91, but was really important, took us 12 court 
appointments over more than a year just to get that money back 
for that child.
    The home forfeitures on average, I would say, lasted about 
three years in the courts.
    Ms. Pressley. Wow.
    Mr. Rulli. So this--even those who succeeded, this was 
weighing over their heads for that long period of time, and 
that really is terrible.
    Ms. Pressley. And just to get a sense of just how many 
people that we are talking about who experience this thievery, 
really, can you tell us roughly how many people whose property 
gets seized through asset forfeiture have actually committed 
any type of crime?
    Mr. Raskin. The gentlelady's time has expired, but you may 
answer that question.
    Mr. Rulli. Well, our experience was that overwhelmingly, 
actually, our clients were never accused or certainly not 
convicted of any crime at all. Really, this is so much taking 
based upon suspicion that's not proven in the courts.
    Ms. Pressley. Thank you.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much, Ms. Pressley, for your 
questioning. Mr. Davis, you are recognized for your five 
minutes now.
    Mr. Davis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And a very informative 
hearing, tremendous information and insights have been given.
    You know, there are some who would argue that there have 
been positive developments by the courts to rein in civil asset 
forfeiture. Specifically, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Timbs 
v. Indiana that the excessive fines clause of the Eighth 
Amendment was applicable to state and local governments in the 
context of asset forfeiture.
    The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that the state's 
excessive fines clause should have applied to a case in which a 
71-year-old woman's home was seized and taken because her son 
allegedly sold $200 worth of marijuana from the property. The 
Pennsylvania court provided guidance on how the excessive fines 
clause should apply in cases such as this.
    However, neither of these opinions created precedent that 
would stop forfeitures from occurring at their outset. The onus 
remains on property owners to challenge the seizures and retain 
counsel that can help them navigate, as you just said a moment 
ago, Professor, the complex processes.
    Professor Rulli, you lead the University of Pennsylvania's 
Law School Practice Clinic, and so I hope you can provide us 
some direct insight into the Young decision. Since Young was 
handed down, have jurisdictions across Pennsylvania reduced 
their use of civil asset forfeits?
    Mr. Rulli. Thank you for that question.
    I wish I could say the answer was yes, but I can't. The 
reality is that, again, the excessive fines clause protection 
will only be of help if it's raised, if there's an opportunity 
of counsel to be there and to provide the representation. And 
the reality is that in so many of the cases, there is no 
representation, and individuals facing forfeiture of their 
property do not know to raise the various protections that do 
exist under the Constitution.
    The Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision is a very important 
decision, and I would hope that one day the U.S. Supreme Court 
would adopt a much more protective framework for all citizens.
    Mr. Davis. Are individuals contesting asset forfeiture able 
to state in their claims that a seizure violates the excessive 
fines clause, allowing for an expedited return of their 
property?
    Mr. Rulli. Yes. That exists as a result of this decision. 
But in practice, it's not happening. Again, because without 
legal help, people do not know that they have this available to 
them. Prosecutors are not sharing this information with the 
individuals from whom they're taking property.
    And so the law can exist, but it doesn't help ordinary 
people unless we are aware of it, unless we have the help that 
we need to express those concerns, and so it then comes back to 
due process. And so we've got a lot of work yet to do.
    Mr. Davis. Thank you. Thank you very much.
    So, the courts in Pennsylvania apply the excessive fines 
clause on a case-by-case basis, and there are no expedited 
processes that would allow laypersons to easily represent 
themselves.
    Mr. Alban, I imagine that this would hold true in the 
federal context as well. Is that true?
    Mr. Alban. That is correct, and the federal system is far 
more complex than Pennsylvania's system because of the addition 
of the administrative forfeiture procedures under federal law. 
So, it's even more difficult for someone to represent 
themselves in a federal forfeiture proceeding than under 
Pennsylvania law.
    Mr. Davis. Is there a role for courts to help prevent these 
forfeitures from occurring in the first place?
    Mr. Alban. Absolutely. There should be judicial review of 
all forfeiture cases. Administrative forfeiture should not 
exist in the first place, but if it does exist, property owners 
should have the ability to appeal any ruling by an 
administrative agency so that an actual Article III judge can 
review the forfeiture and determine whether or not it's 
legitimate.
    Mr. Davis. Thank you. Thank you very much.
    And Ms. Ahmad, if I could ask you a brief question?
    Mr. Raskin. OK, yes. This will be your final question. 
Thank you.
    Mr. Davis. All right. How does this lack of guidance affect 
the greater civil asset landscape, and what does it imply for 
ongoing efforts at reform?
    Ms. Ahmad. Thank you for the question.
    Well, what it implies for ongoing efforts is that more 
reform is needed at the federal level particularly. Violations 
of CAFRA are occurring right now. A DHS report from last year 
reports that a process, a negotiation process that feels like 
extortion is going on, even as CAFRA is supposed to prevent 
that kind of conduct, where agents are bypassing the judicial 
process and not working with federal prosecutors to file a 
claim and go to court and seize the asset.
    Instead, they waive their own deadline. They don't talk to 
the federal prosecutor, and they call up the property owner, 
and they negotiate a settlement, not unlike Congressman Clyde's 
case.
    Mr. Davis. Thank you very much. And Mr. Chairman, I yield 
back.
    Mr. Raskin. Thank you very much for your questioning, and I 
turn now to the vice chair of the committee, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, 
for her five minutes of questioning. And thank you for your 
patience.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you so much, Chair Raskin.
    Yes, I believe that there are two things to understand from 
our witness testimony today, and I want to thank our witnesses 
who are here in person as well as those joining us digitally 
for sharing their experiences and expertise today.
    But you know, I think this is just simply an issue that 
Americans, so many people in this country, cannot believe is 
real. Civil forfeiture--Mr. Alban, civil forfeiture means that 
the government, law enforcement, et cetera, is allowed to take 
away your property, often your car or even your home, without 
an arrest, without criminal charges, and without ever going to 
court. Correct?
    Mr. Alban. That is correct.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And as long as the police can claim that 
they believe this property is in some way connected to a crime, 
the seizure of one's property can just happen without any sort 
of recourse in the immediate term. Correct?
    Mr. Alban. That's absolutely true under the federal 
process.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And then the police can sell your home 
or sell this property and use the proceeds as revenues. 
Correct?
    Mr. Alban. After the property has been forfeited, yes.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Now, second, we know, Ms. Ahmad, that in 
the United States our criminal system over targets the poor and 
over targets people of color, particularly Black Americans. 
Correct?
    Ms. Ahmad. That's correct.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And it relies on the kind of 
exploitation, the fact that so many people do not have the 
ability or the resources to get adequate defense to allow this 
to persist. But when we put these two things together, what we 
get is a picture of what is happening now, that in the vast 
majority of civil forfeiture cases, the government is driving 
away cars, kicking people out of their homes for claimed 
suspicion. But not even the person that has this property needs 
to be connected to any of these crimes. This happens without 
arrest, without criminal charges.
    So, Professor Rulli, what you see in your practice 
essentially is the combination of the inherent biases and, 
frankly, institutional racism and classism of our criminal 
system, combined with civil asset forfeiture means it is 
disproportionately poor people, low-income people, and people 
of color that are having their property seized without really 
any proven cause. Correct?
    Mr. Rulli. That is correct. And in fact, we map that in 
Philadelphia. We actually use geo mapping to show that. You're 
absolutely right.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you so much, Professor Rulli.
    And we have one of those people with us here today, with 
our witness, with Ms. Harris. Ms. Harris, the police, as you 
mentioned in your testimony, drove your car away and for a 
reason that you were not completely understood when it was 
given to you. And they didn't even show you a single slip of 
paper when they took your car away, right?
    Ms. Harris. Correct.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. That is correct. And Ms. Harris, how 
long did the government take to contact you with a notice after 
they drove away with your car? You had mentioned it earlier.
    Ms. Harris. Five years.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. So, they took your car without a shred 
of documentation, and they took five years to get back to you 
about that?
    Ms. Harris. Yes, right.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And when they got back to you about 
that, how long did the government, after they took five years 
of their time, their sweet time, how much time did they give 
you to respond to their notice?
    Ms. Harris. I believe it was between 25 and 21 days, and 
that was what they gave me. And they put the wrong address on 
there. So, by the time I got that paperwork, I actually had two 
weeks.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. So, any amount of things could have 
happened. I mean, you could have moved. You could have had a 
change of address. They took five years to get to you, and then 
they gave you 21 days to respond to an enormous asset that they 
had seized that's absolutely devastating to just lose 
overnight. That's what happened?
    Ms. Harris. Yes, correct.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And initially, you weren't even going to 
pursue recourse because the legal fees associated with getting 
your car back, before pro bono help was extended to you, you 
were just going to take it as a loss. Is that correct?
    Ms. Harris. Yes.
    Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. See, you know, and Chair Raskin, this is 
the thing that it gets down to is the fact that, increasingly, 
so many of our communities, including the Bronx and Queens that 
I represent, do not believe and are increasingly not believing 
that we have a justice system in the United States. That this 
is just a punishment system that we have, a criminal system 
that does not even really center the actual justice of their 
innocence and actually give them benefit of the doubt.
    We have a system that does not presume innocence until one 
is proven guilty unless you are wealthy or privileged in this 
country. And that is what we are here to really address. So, I 
thank you for calling the hearing, and I greatly look forward 
to our continuing work on this matter.
    Mr. Raskin. And thank you very much to the vice chair for 
her insightful questioning.
    I am going to ask the ranking member, Ms. Mace, for any 
closing remarks or thoughts she has before I offer my own.
    Ms. Mace. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I want to thank you for having this hearing today, 
having worked on it, like you, as a state lawmaker and coming 
to Congress. And then seeing, when we bring together members of 
the Squad and the Freedom Caucus, and we are all working 
together on the same issue is quite the feat, and it is past 
time that we work together. It is quite an achievement and 
shows that this is necessary, very much needed, past time to 
work together on this.
    Because there is something really wrong with this issue, 
and Congress is finally doing something about it. So, thank you 
for this great step in having and hosting this hearing.
    And I want to thank everyone who participated and Ms. 
Harris for sharing her personal story. Congressman Clyde, my 
colleague, for being so insightful in your story as well. I 
want to thank everyone for making the effort to be here and let 
us do something about it.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Raskin. And Ms. Mace, thank you so much for your 
wonderful participation in this hearing and this issue.
    Before I make a closing remark, I just want to ask 
unanimous consent to enter into the record two Institute for 
Justice reports, ``Policing for Profit'' and ``Does Forfeiture 
Work?''
    And without objection, an ACLU policy brief, ``Profiting 
from California's Most Vulnerable.''
    Without objection, a Center for American Progress report, 
``Forfeiting the American Dream.''
    Without objection, and a letter signed by 16 different 
nonprofit groups supporting federal civil asset forfeiture 
reforms, dated March 15, 2015.
    All of these will be entered into the record.
    Mr. Raskin. I just want to close with a few thoughts about 
the fundamental importance of this hearing. I often think that 
the two most beautiful words in the English language, certainly 
in the law, but perhaps in the English language are ``due 
process'' because all of us have had the experience and know 
the indignity and the injustice of being wrongly accused of 
something and then having something taken away from us because 
of that.
    And that is what due process is all about. We have got, in 
the civil asset forfeiture system, a whole apparatus and 
bureaucracy of government that inverts the general principles 
of due process. The basic idea is that we are all presumed 
innocent. In America, we are presumed innocent unless the 
government can actually show probable cause and make a case 
against us, sustaining its burden of proving beyond a 
reasonable doubt that we have committed a crime.
    But other than that, we are presumed to be innocent. And 
yet what is happening and what we have heard from Ms. Harris 
and the stories that we have heard from around the country are 
of people having their property taken away from them, whether 
it is their life savings that they happen to have in their 
pocket because they are going to purchase a car or going to put 
a down payment on a house. It could be a car itself in lots of 
these cases. It could even be an apartment or a condo. It could 
be a bank account, as in the case of Mr. Clyde.
    All of that is happening without people being charged with 
a crime. In many cases, without being accused of a crime. 
Certainly without being convicted of a crime, without being 
sentenced to a crime. But their property has been taken away.
    And at that point, the whole system of due process is 
thrown out, and now you need to go out and hire a lawyer, if 
you can afford one, as Ms. Harris underscores. If you can 
afford one, you have got to go find a lawyer to go and sue the 
government and prove that you are innocent. Your property is 
innocent. Or if you are not innocent, there is no nexus between 
you and the property, but even that connection seems to be 
thrown out the window because the assumption is if there is 
some cloud over you, then your property is definitely guilty, 
and the government is going to keep it. And that is wrong.
    So, we have got a serious problem here, and it is something 
that affects every citizen. Whether you are a wealthy 
businessman in Georgia with $1 million in the bank or you are a 
homeless person in Springfield, Massachusetts, who has to her 
name only a car, you can be affected by this totally arbitrary 
inversion of due process.
    And it is also true, as I think has been shown by several 
witnesses today, that in the absence of constitutional due 
process, then all of the background inequalities of our society 
and the background injuries of race and class come to bear 
because some people are able to fend for themselves if they can 
afford a lawyer or if they have got the benefit of the 
Institute for Justice or the Goldwater Center. But without it, 
if you don't have the means to do it, then you are really at 
the mercy of a rather merciless system, as the Institute for 
Justice has documented in this excellent poster, which 
demonstrates the byzantine complexity of this Orwellian and 
Kafkaesque system that has grown up.
    So, that is a real problem, and we didn't even really get 
into the corruption of the government and law enforcement 
agencies and bureaucratic departments themselves. I mean, it 
has been mentioned several times, but it is almost worth a 
hearing of its own. What does it do when the government 
agencies are told you can keep either 100 percent or a large 
part of the proceeds that you seize from people?
    Well, you start focusing on one side of the street, as Mr. 
Alban says, and not on the other side of the street. You are 
looking for the money. You are not necessarily looking for the 
drugs.
    And I do think that this whole problem has clearly been 
exacerbated by the war on drugs because it is such a cash-
intensive business. There is so much money out there to be 
seized, and this is another way in which the war on drugs is 
eroding the basic civil liberties infrastructure of our 
constitutional system.
    So, we have got to clean this up. I mean, part of me says 
we should just get rid of the whole thing and say the 
government can't take anybody's property until they have 
actually arrested you, indicted you, prosecuted you, convicted 
you, and then they can take your stuff from you.
    But the legislation, which Congressman Walberg and I have 
been working on--and he has been such a powerful intellectual 
force in this field--this legislation doesn't go that far. This 
legislation should be able to be agreed to by everybody across 
the spectrum, whether you want to see things through the eyes 
of law enforcement or you want to see things through the eyes 
of somebody who has been the victim of one of these 
forfeitures.
    What it does is it says we are going to shift the burden of 
proof back onto the government. The government has got to prove 
by clear and convincing evidence that your property is guilty 
in connection with a crime, either the proceeds of the crime or 
an instrument of making the crime happen, rather than your 
having to go and prove that it is innocent. We want to increase 
transparency around the whole process, and we want to 
dramatically restrict the use of equitable sharing agreements 
between DOJ and local and state law enforcement.
    I hope this is something that we can move in this session 
of Congress, that we can get it done on a bipartisan basis. I 
urge all of my colleagues on the committee and beyond who are 
watching to join us in H.R. 2857.
    I want to thank the vice chair for her eloquent remarks and 
the ranking member for her wonderful participation today.
    Mr. Clyde, thank you for joining us and hanging with the 
subcommittee, and I want to thank everybody on the subcommittee 
for their focus on this.
    And our witnesses have been wonderful today. Thank you all, 
and we are determined to get this done.
    You will have I think it is five days--one second. Yes. All 
members will have five days within which to submit additional 
written questions for the witnesses, and we will forward them 
to you. And we are also available for any additional materials 
that you want to send us. And we ask our witnesses to please 
respond as promptly as you can to any further questions that 
are sent to you.
    Without any further business, this hearing is adjourned, 
and thank you all for participating in it.
    [Whereupon, at 12:12 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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