BRADENTON POLICE DEPARTMENT BYPASSING COURTS IN FORFEITURES

BRADENTON -- For years, the Bradenton Police Department has quietly,
without judicial review, confiscated hundreds of thousands of dollars
in cash and property from people they arrested for drug possession
and other crimes.

The police bypass the courts and confiscate money and property on the
spot through a department-created form called the "Contraband
Forfeiture Agreement." By signing it, a person agrees to relinquish
their property to the police and waive any rights they have to try to
get it back through the courts.

In some cases -- including one last year where police seized more
than $43,000 from a man during a traffic stop -- people have signed
over cash and other property without ever getting charged with a crime.

The cash and revenue from other forfeited property, such as cars,
DVDs and TVs, go into a police bank account and is spent on
equipment, drug abuse prevention and community-based programs. The
bank account has reached $150,000 in recent years.

Attorneys and constitutional law scholars say they are concerned
Bradenton police may be pressuring people to sign away property --
and their legal rights -- without an attorney. State laws under the
Florida Contraband Forfeiture Act say a person is entitled to have a
judge, not a police officer, determine the merits of forfeiture.

"Who knows what they are telling people to get them to sign it," said
Sarasota-based defense attorney Henry E. Lee, who represented a woman
last year in a police forfeiture case in Bradenton. "This is a source
of revenue for the police, and it's just rife for abuse."

A Manatee County judge last year found fault with the department's
forfeiture procedure in a case where police took more than $7,000
from a woman arrested for a driver's license violation after a traffic stop.

Judge Douglas Henderson said [Name redacted] , 28, did not knowingly
and willingly agree to give up her money -- despite the appearance of
her name on the department's forfeiture agreement.

Police were ordered to return the money.

Bradenton Police Chief Michael Radzilowski said Henderson did not
dismiss the agreement itself in the [Name redacted] case.

"He didn't say the written agreement wasn't any good," Radzilowski
said. "If the courts say we're doing something improper or illegal,
we'll change it."

The contraband agreement, which purports to be a binding, legal
document, is expected to become the centerpiece of a court fight in
Manatee County. A lawsuit filed this week challenges the legitimacy
of the forfeiture document.

The case is rooted in the police seizure of $10,020 from a
20-year-old Orlando man, [Name redacted] , in July.

[Name redacted] , questioned amid a robbery investigation, was
arrested on a rarely used charge of failing to report a business
transaction that exceeds $10,000.

But prosecutors said it's not a crime to carry that amount of cash,
and the state dropped the charge in August.

[Name redacted] , police say, signed away his rights to the cash and
authorities deposited the money in a police account within a week of
the arrest.

Police say it will take a court order to get them to return [Name redacted]

cash.

[Name redacted] attorneys want a judge to force the police department
to use the courts in forfeiture cases and to stop negotiating with
people as they are arrested.

Bradenton is the only law enforcement agency in the area that doesn't
file its forfeiture complaints in court to initiate proceedings.

"Hopefully, we'll put a stop to it when we get in front of a judge,"
said attorney Louis Daniel Lazaro, who represents [Name redacted] .
"There are possible corruption charges on a criminal level."

Police dismiss any notion that they are bullying people into signing
away cash and property.

Radzilowski defends the practice, saying a person has a right to
decide how to dispose of their property.

"People involved in crime are more apt to walk away from the money,"
the chief said. "We're not looking to take money from innocent
people. We're only trying to take the profit out of the narcotics business."

Radzilowski said very few people who contest forfeiture actually win in court.

[Name redacted] isn't the first person who later had second thoughts
about signing their property away, Radzilowski said.

"This is not the first, and it won't be the last legal fight,"
Radzilowski said.

The bulk of Bradenton's forfeiture cases involve cash and property
worth between $50 and $5,000, but occasionally the bounty can be much higher.

In two cases alone last year, police seized more than $100,000.

Police stopped [Name redacted] for a traffic violation in January
2005 and ended up taking $43,551 from him through a contraband
agreement. Court records show [Name redacted] , 47, was not charged
with a crime.

Benji Ackerman Jr., 34, was part of a cocaine distribution ring that
city police dismantled last year. Ackerman got an 18-year federal
prison sentence in June.

City police got $62,760 from him before he was put away.

Bradenton police reports show that officers have seized $12,638 from
15 people since early August. Most of the people were arrested on
drug-related charges.

[Name redacted] , 56, was in her front yard when police swooped in
last month to target an area fraught with drug sales.

Brooks was arrested when investigators said they found drugs, and her
car and cash were seized.

The incident, [Name redacted] said, happened in a flash, and while
she sat in the back of a police cruiser an officer prodded her until
she signed over about $1,200 to the Bradenton Police Department.

She said she had no idea what she was signing -- only that police
told her that "things would go a lot smoother" if she signed it.

"He kept rushing me, like, 'Go ahead, things will be better if you
did,'" [Name redacted] said. "It was like, there's gonna be some big
time stuff that happens to me if I don't sign it."

Bradenton resident [Name redacted] was arrested this month in a drug
investigation and taken to police headquarters, but he was released
without being charged with a crime.

Police said they saw [Name redacted] throw two pieces of crack
cocaine from a car window one evening in the 2600 block of 9th Street West.

[Name redacted] , 21, who has a record of drug-related crimes, was
searched for drugs. An officer dug into a pocket and pulled out cash.

"This is drug money. This is drug money," [Name redacted] recalled an
officer tell him, holding his cash.

"They went all up in my pockets. I didn't have no dope on me that day."

An officer put the "white, small objects that appeared to be crack
cocaine" into a bag and placed it into the property department,
according to police reports.

"They are arresting me but trying to tell me I know somebody. They
wanted me to set someone up," said [Name redacted] , who denied
throwing anything out of the car window. "They said they would issue
a warrant for my arrest."

Police took $30 from [Name redacted] , according to the Contraband
Forfeiture Agreement he signed.

[Name redacted] is adamant that police took more money -- two $50s
that were not reported in the agreement.

[Name redacted] also insists the only document he signed is a sheet
on which Miranda Rights were printed