Florida, like other states, has a forfeiture law that allows the state to take ownership of people’s property when those people are suspected of committing certain crimes. The forfeiture laws are brutal because the state does not need to prove the suspect committed a crime to take that person’s property.…
When the police are investigating a crime in Florida and seize property that they believe is proceeds of criminal activity or used to facilitate criminal activity, a forfeiture case might result. A forfeiture case is a separate case where the state attempts to assume ownership of property that they seize…
Florida, like many states and the federal government, has some draconian asset forfeiture laws. For some reason, the state’s practice of forfeiting property from suspects based on very little evidence does not get much coverage, but taking property from people suspected of committing crimes is a favorite practice of police…
Many states have laws that allow the police and other law enforcement agencies to take a person’s property with very little evidence of criminal activity. In fact, it is not uncommon for the police to obtain ownership of a person’s property, referred to as forfeiture under Florida law, without ever…
A practice of the government, normally the federal government but sometimes state and local law enforcement as well, many people may not be aware of is the freezing of a defendant’s assets before he/she has ever been convicted of a crime. For instance, a law enforcement agency might contact the…
As we have mentioned many times before on this website, we have seen many cases where a Florida law enforcement agency has taken money or other property from a person without any indication that the person or the property was involved in criminal activity. The Florida forfeiture laws allow the…
Over the years, handling asset forfeiture cases in Florida and Georgia, we have seen some eye-opening practices of police and other law enforcement agencies designed to take property from people for their own benefit. It is not uncommon for law enforcement agencies to take large amounts of money or other…
As criminal defense and asset forfeiture attorneys in the Jacksonville, Florida area, we have seen the many different ways the government will take and forfeit someone’s property under the state or federal asset forfeiture laws. These cases have ranged from questionable searches seemingly designed to seize and forfeit certain property…
The War on Drugs rages on with big government-loving police and prosecutors seeking to take property from citizens for their involvement with the marijuana plant. In a recent case near Jacksonville, Florida, the War on Drugs manifested itself in the government’s attempt to take a house from a person for…
While people normally have a pretty good familiarity with criminal laws, they do not always understand how the forfeiture laws work. The federal government has forfeiture laws that allow the government to seize and keep the property of people for a variety of reasons. The government can take and hold…