Apparently it's still against the law to be a minority in many parts of the south.
"It was give them the money or they were taking our kids," Boatright said. "They suggested that we never bring it up again. We figured we better give them our cash and get the hell out of there."
From the A.P.:
Police seizure of items in East Texas town spurs lawsuit, reform effort
12:00 AM CST on Monday, February 9, 2009
The Associated Press
SAN ANTONIO – A state law that allows authorities to seize property is being used by some to grab cash, jewelry, vehicles and other valuables without so much as a criminal charge, never mind a conviction.
Law enforcement officers in Tenaha, a chicken farming town of 1,000 people near the Louisiana line, took property from at least 140 motorists between 2006 and 2008 – filing criminal charges against fewer than half, according to court documents reviewed by the San Antonio Express-News.
In some cases, affidavits filed by officers relied on the presence of seemingly innocent property as the only evidence that a crime had occurred, but motorists were told to waive their rights to the property or face jail and criminal charges, said attorney David Guillory, who represents a group of motorists who have filed suit against officials in the town and Shelby County.
All 10 of Guillory's clients are black and were driving rental cars or vehicles with out-of-state plates.
The chairman of the state Senate Criminal Justice Committee, Sen. John Whitmire, said enough jurisdictions across the state have abused the law over the last two decades that it's due for an overhaul. The Houston Democrat wants to rewrite major sections of the law this legislative session.
One of Guillory's clients, Linda Dorman, a great-grandmother from Akron, Ohio, had $4,000 in cash taken from her when she was stopped on her way home from Houston in April 2007. Court records list nothing illegal found in her van. The money, she said, was her life savings.
Under Texas' civil forfeiture law, authorities must only show by a preponderance of evidence that the money was the proceeds of or purchased with the proceeds of certain crimes, such as drug crimes.
The burden is much lower than in a criminal case, and it allows police and prosecutors to divvy up what they seize – something critics say works as an incentive for unscrupulous police agencies to strip motorists of their property.
Supporters, however, say that when used right, the law allows police to go after criminals using their own money.
Tenaha Mayor George Bowers defended the seizures in his town, saying they allowed the city to add a second police car and helped fund a new police station.
Also read this link from Howard Witt in today's Chicago Tribune.
An excerpt:
David Guillory, an attorney in Nacogdoches who filed the federal lawsuit, said he combed through Shelby County court records from 2006 to 2008 and discovered nearly 200 cases in which Tenaha police seized cash and property from motorists. In about 50 of the cases, suspects were charged with drug possession.
But in 147 others, Guillory said the court records showed, police seized cash, jewelry, cell phones and sometimes even automobiles from motorists but never found any contraband or charged them with any crime. Of those, Guillory said he managed to contact 40 of the motorists directly—and discovered all but one of them were black.
"The whole thing is disproportionately targeted toward minorities, particularly African-Americans," Guillory said. "None of these people have been charged with a crime, none were engaged in anything that looked criminal. The sole factor is that they had something that looked valuable."
In some cases, police used the fact that motorists were carrying large amounts of cash as evidence that they must have been involved in laundering drug money, even though Guillory said each of the drivers he contacted could account for where the money had come from and why they were carrying it—such as for a gambling trip to Shreveport, La., or to purchase a used car from a private seller.
Once the motorists were detained, the police and the local Shelby County district attorney quickly drew up legal papers presenting them with an option: waive their rights to their cash and property or face felony charges for crimes such as money laundering—and the prospect of having to hire a lawyer and return to Shelby County multiple times to attend court sessions to contest the charges.
The process apparently is so routine in Tenaha that Guillory discovered pre-signed and pre-notarized police affidavits with blank spaces left for an officer to describe the property being seized.
Jennifer Boatright, her husband and two young children—a mixed-race family—were traveling from Houston to visit relatives in east Texas in April 2007 when Tenaha police pulled them over, alleging that they were driving in a left-turn lane.
After searching the car, the officers discovered what Boatright said was a gift for her sister: a small, unused glass pipe made for smoking marijuana. Although they found no drugs or other contraband, the police seized $6,037 that Boatright said the family was carrying to purchase a used car—and then threatened to turn their children, ages 10 and 1, over to Child Protective Services if the couple didn't agree to sign over their right to their cash.
And down on the bayou, get a taste of southern justice in Homer, Louisiana, also from Howard Witt and The Tribune:
Reporting from Homer, La. -- On the last afternoon of his life, Bernard Monroe was hosting a cookout for family and friends in front of his dilapidated home in this small northern Louisiana town.
Throat cancer had left the 73-year-old retired electric utility worker unable to talk, but family members said he clearly was enjoying the commotion of a dozen of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren cavorting in the grassless yard.
Then the Homer police showed up, two white officers whose arrival caused the participants at the black family's gathering to fall silent.
Within moments, Monroe was dead, shot by one of the officers as his family looked on.
Now the Louisiana State Police, the FBI and the Justice Department are swarming over this impoverished lumber town of 3,800, drawn by allegations from numerous witnesses that police killed Monroe without justification -- and then moved a gun to make it look like he had been holding it.
"We are closely monitoring the events in Homer," said Donald Washington, the U.S. attorney for the western district of Louisiana. "I understand that a number of allegations are being made that, if true, would be serious enough for us to follow up on very quickly."
Monroe's friends and relatives say they still don't understand why the neighborhood patriarch ended up dead.
Four witnesses said he was sitting outside his home in the late afternoon on Feb. 20 -- clutching a large sports-drink bottle -- when two police officers pulled up and summoned over his son, Shawn.
Shawn Monroe, who has a long record of arrests and convictions on charges of assault and battery but was not wanted on any warrants, reportedly ran into the house.
One of the officers, who had been on Homer's police force only a few weeks, chased after him and reappeared moments later in the doorway, the witnesses said.
Meanwhile, the elder Monroe had started walking toward the front door. When he got to the first step on the porch, the witnesses said, the rookie officer opened fire, striking Monroe several times.
"He just shot him through the screen door," said Denise Nicholson, a family friend who said she was standing a few feet away. "After [Monroe] was on the ground, we kept asking the officer to call an ambulance, but all he did was get on his radio and say, 'Officer in distress.' "
The witnesses said the second officer picked up a handgun that Monroe, an avid hunter, always kept in plain sight on the porch for protection. Using a latex glove, the officer grasped the gun by its handle, the witnesses said, and ordered everyone to back away. The next thing they said they saw was the gun next to Monroe's body.
"I saw him pick up the gun off the porch," Marcus Frazier said. "I said, 'What are you doing?' The cop told me, 'Shut the hell up, you don't know what you're talking about.' "
Homer police maintain Monroe was holding a loaded gun when he was shot, but would not comment further.
The shooting took place amid long-standing tensions between police and the residents of Monroe's crime-plagued neighborhood.
"People here are afraid of the police," said Terry Willis, vice president of the Homer branch of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. "They harass black people, they stop people for no reason and rough them up without charging them with anything."
That is how it should be, responded Homer Police Chief Russell Mills, who noted the high rates of gun and drug arrests in the neighborhood.
"If I see three or four young black men walking down the street, I have to stop them and check their names," said Mills, who is white. "I want them to be afraid every time they see the police that they might get arrested.
"We're not out there trying to abuse and harass people -- we're trying to protect the law-abiding citizens locked behind their doors in fear."
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