Interesting story at Reason. Through the barbaric practice of civil asset forfeiture, Federal agents took $107,000 from Lyndon McLellan, a convenience store owner for the non-crime of making “suspiciously small deposits” at his bank. Well, he lawyered up and fought back, and eventually won back all his money. Not only that, but now he will be reimbursed for legal expenses, as well as the interest that the stolen money could have earned had it not been seized. Unsurprisingly, a federal prosecutor attempted to intimidate McLellan into not exposing the official criminality he had been subjected to, while offering to give back only half of the money taken. While he did get his money back, take a moment to reflect on the deep-rooted evil that has taken hold to the point that a federal prosecutor, who knows that this man is innocent, would offer only half that man’s money back?
