High Court Says Dealers Can Lose Liberty, Property Forfeiture Of A Convict’s Goods Does Not Constitute Double Jeopardy
In a major victory for federal prosecutors, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday that the government can both prosecute someone for a crime and seize his property through civil forfeiture without violating the constitutional bar against double jeopardy.
The 8-1 ruling endorses a double-punch strategy increasingly employed in recent years by the federal government and numerous states in fighting narcotics trafficking, conspiracy and other crimes. Even as they prosecute suspects on criminal charges, law enforcement agencies now commonly use civil forfeiture proceedings to seize cars, boats, homes and other property used in the criminal activities.
Two appeals courts had found that the combination of a criminal conviction and a civil forfeiture - arising from the same offense - is unconstitutional. But the high court rejected that view Monday and ruled that civil forfeiture, an action officially taken against a piece of property rather than a person, is not “punishment” for double jeopardy purposes.
The Department of Justice collected nearly $550 million in assets from criminals in 1994 and shared almost $235 million with state and local law enforcement agencies, according to a report submitted to Congress Monday.
Civil forfeiture has been used to confiscate not only the ill-gotten gains of crime but the houses and personal property of suspected wrongdoers. It is easier for prosecutors to prove fault in civil proceedings than in a criminal trial.
In one of the cases before the court, Guy Jerome Ursery, of Perry, Mich., was sentenced to five years in prison after he was caught growing marijuana on his land. His house was also targeted for forfeiture, and he was obliged to make a cash settlement with the government to save it.
“Going after drug proceeds is one thing, but what about a man’s house?” said attorney Lawrence Emery, representing Ursery. “We think government’s exercise of power in this case is needlessly overbearing.”
But Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who wrote for the court, said, “Requiring the forfeiture of property used to commit federal narcotics violations encourages property owners to take care in managing their property and ensures that they will not permit that property to be used for illegal purposes.”
Only Justice John Paul Stevens dissented, saying of Ursery’s situation, “There is simply no rational basis for characterizing the seizure of this … home as anything other than punishment for his crime. The house was neither proceeds nor contraband and its value had no relation to the government’s authority to seize it.”
Because the Fifth Amendment’s double jeopardy clause protects defendants against being punished for the same crime twice, the key question was whether government’s confiscation of homes and businesses connected to criminal wrongdoing is “punishment.”
Rehnquist emphasized that civil forfeiture is a legal action against a piece of property: “Forfeitures serve a variety of purposes, but are designed primarily to confiscate property used in violation of the law, and to require disgorgement of the fruits of illegal conduct,” he said.
Rehnquist’s opinion was signed by Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Anthony M. Kennedy, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer. Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas concurred in the judgment but wrote separately to assert that the Constitution bars only successive prosecutions, not successive punishment.
The ruling, United States vs. Ursery, came in consolidated cases from California as well as Michigan. In the California dispute, James Wren and Charles Arlt were convicted of conspiracy and money laundering arising from a large methamphetamine manufacturing operation and a phony gold mining scheme. Both men got life terms. In a separate civil forfeiture proceeding, they were forced to turn over $405,089 in proceeds from their drug dealing.
xxxx IN OTHER ACTION Also Monday, the Supreme Court: Overturned on an 8-1 vote a judge’s order that required Arizona’s prison warden to have first-rate law libraries and to help illiterate inmates file legal challenges. Ruled 5-4 that defendants charged with multiple petty offenses are not entitled to a jury trial.