WHAT A DEAL

The Pinellas County Sheriff Has Some Explaining To Do After Deputies
Had A Woman Sign Away Her Car To Avoid A Drug Charge. This Is Just
Another Inappropriate Use Of The State's Forfeiture Law

The deputy made Tomeca Demps an offer she thought she couldn't refuse.
Sign a paper giving the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office ownership of
her car and she would not be charged with a felony drug offense.
Although Demps had committed no crime, she feared arrest and signed
the agreement. Deputies took her 1968 Buick Skylark, a vintage car
with, they noted, a nice stereo system. Call it eBay justice.

Demps had second thoughts and hired a lawyer, and when Times reporter
William R. Levesque started asking about the situation, the Sheriff's
Office decided to return the car. "We don't stipulate seizure as a
condition of not being arrested," said Marianne Pasha, spokesman for
Sheriff Everett Rice.

But that is exactly what happened in this case, and Rice has some
explaining to do. The agreement signed by Demps, a 31-year-old
babysitter, stated that she would not be charged in a drug
investigation in which her car had been seized after a pound of
marijuana was found in it. Investigators determined that an
acquaintance had put the marijuana there without Demps' knowledge.

Florida law is clear on when property used in a crime can be
confiscated. The "seizing agency" must present convincing evidence
that "the owner either knew, or should have known after a reasonable
inquiry, that the property was being employed . . . in criminal
activity." The Sheriff's Office admits that Demps knew nothing about
the drugs in her car.

It's "cash-register justice," said veteran criminal defense attorney
Denis de Vlaming. "It's like being offered the opportunity to buy your
way out of trouble."

In this case, it looks as though the law was used to intimidate a
naive person into giving up her property. While this was a
particularly inappropriate use of the state's forfeiture law, it is
hardly the only abuse. The Legislature has made it too easy for law
enforcement officials to seize property even when the criminal case
against the owner is minor or weak. That's why so many police
officials in Tampa and elsewhere drive Lexuses and Lincoln Navigators.
Given their budgetary constraints, police agencies find such property
a tempting source of revenue, but the practice is corrupting.

Most Floridians would probably agree that airplanes, boats and cars
used in serious criminal activities are fair game for forfeiture.
Using the law to scare an innocent woman into giving up her Buick
Skylark is obviously an inappropriate use of the law.