Police Take $43,000 Cash From Jewelry Business Under Controversial Law Allowing Warrantless Money Seizures: Report

A small business run by a husband-and-wife duo is reportedly out $43,000 after police decided to seize a cash transfer sent to them through FedEx.

Henry and Minh Cheng, who run a small jewelry business, are suing the state of Indiana after police showed up at a FedEx depot and seized a package sent to the couple containing the cash, the Indianapolis Star reports.

According to the lawsuit, the package of cash was sent to the Chengs from a client in Virginia in exchange for gold chains. The prosecutor’s office in Marion County, Indiana, says such shipments of cash are usually associated with criminal activity. While the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department says that dogs alerted them to the smell of drugs in the package, nothing illegal was actually found in it.

However, authorities have been hanging on to the cash for more than four months – even though the couple have not been charged with any crimes related to the package.

The Chengs are working with the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit focused on civil liberties, to sue the state under allegations of widespread patterns of unlawful seizures at the FedEx depot in Indianapolis.

Police were able to seize the Chengs’ money under a law known as civil forfeiture, which essentially allows the government to take property and then sell it without charging anyone with a crime.

Says the Institute for Justice,

“Using civil forfeiture, the government can seize and sell your property without convicting you of a crime or even charging you with one. Often, the same officials who seize property get to pocket the proceeds as well.

This gives police and prosecutors a direct and powerful financial incentive to seize first and ask questions later. And that is why forfeiture activity has exploded across the nation in the last few years.”

Under Indiana law, the government can take the Chengs’ cash and transfer it directly into the state’s law enforcement fund, the general fund of the state and other public branches.

Lawyers for the Chengs say that the practice is “simply profiteering,” far removed from any kind of law enforcement.

Says Henry Cheng,

“I think it’s unfair, and it just shouldn’t happen in America.”

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