In America, law enforcement can do something similar through a process known as “civil forfeiture,” which allows the government to seize your property even without charging you with a crime. All they need is the “presumption” that your property might “facilitate” a crime, and the government sues your property rather than you. This is a horrible abuse of power and risks policing for profit—the city of Philadelphia alone makes $6 million a year from civil forfeiture.
Disturbingly, 80 percent of the Philadelphia residents who contributed to that $6 million were never even charged with a crime. Even when confirmed crimes were involved, they were often disturbingly small or committed by people other than the homeowners—one couple had their house seized because their son was caught selling $40 worth of marijuana.
Although I’m not convinced that Michael Brown and “Stop and Frisk” quite belong on this list.
