PRESSURE TO CHANGE POLICE SYSTEM OF PROPERTY SEIZURES BEING APPLIED IN CONGRESS

Two members of Missouri's congressional delegation say they will look for
ways Congress can stop state and local police agencies from evading state
laws when seizing drug money.

A spokeswoman for House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, a St. Louis
Democrat, said a reform forfeiture law going into effect in August failed
to address the handoffs of seizures from local to federal agencies.

"We'll look to see what options are present in the next Congress (to fix
the problem)," said Sue Harvey, Gephardt's spokeswoman. "This is something
that we hoped we would have addressed with the (new law)."

U.S. Rep. Karen McCarthy, a Kansas City Democrat, said her staff already
had begun working on legislation to address police keeping drug-money
forfeitures, which she sees as a conflict of interest and a threat to civil
liberties.

"I feel very strongly that the seizure laws need to be quite clear and also
that the individual rights must not be violated," McCarthy said.

Most states have passed laws blocking seized property from going directly
back to police, because they do not want police profiting from their own
efforts. Many states designate seizures to be used for other purposes, such
as education.

Last month, however, stories published by The Kansas City Star showed that
police agencies in every one of more than two dozen states checked by the
newspaper circumvented their own laws and kept millions of dollars in
seizures for themselves.

When police seize money or property, they hand it over to a federal law
enforcement agency, which keeps a cut, usually 20 percent, and returns the
rest to police.

Some states are attempting to block the handoffs, but McCarthy said federal
legislation was necessary.

"We need to figure out what we can do to try to get this rectified, because
I think the only solution is at the federal level," McCarthy said.

Passing federal legislation will be no easy feat, however.

One drawback is the forfeiture reform law that Congress just passed in
April. Many say Congress will be reluctant to reopen a subject that was
bitterly debated before a bill finally passed.

Another obstacle is the political clout of law enforcement and the Justice
Department, which put heavy pressure this spring on Senate negotiators to
weaken the bill.

"There is a substantial police lobby against doing anything in this area,"
said U.S. Rep. Melvin Watt, a North Carolina Democrat and member of the
Judiciary Committee.

McCarthy said she did not care.

"What law enforcement is doing is superseding state law by coming up to the
federal level, and we are just going to have to take on this lobby and try
to get the job done," she said.

The Justice Department did not respond to requests for interviews.

In the Missouri governor's race, Democrat Bob Holden, currently state
treasurer, said he would call a statewide summit to bring together
prosecutors and law enforcement at every level and work out the differences
between state and federal forfeiture laws.

"We need to see how we could better coordinate and understand the
intricacies of state and federal law," said Richard Martin, Holden's
campaign manager.

U.S. Rep. Jim Talent, Holden's Republican gubernatorial opponent, did not
comment for this story.

Gov. Mel Carnahan, a Democrat, would not comment on the subject for more
than a year but finally said through a spokesman last week that he stood
behind the Missouri Highway Patrol. Nonetheless, Carnahan, who is running
for U.S. senator, said if elected he would take a hard look at federal and
state forfeiture laws and try to work out the conflicts between them.

Carnahan's opponent, Sen. John Ashcroft, and Kit Bond, Missouri's other
U.S. senator, both Republicans, would not comment for this story.

Forfeitures, however, already are becoming part of the campaign in the
revitalized race in Missouri's 6th Congressional District, where the
incumbent, Democrat Pat Danner, recently announced she would not run again.

Steve Danner, who is running for his mother's job, said he would push for
federal legislation if elected.

"Unfortunately, to me it appears that the real culprits of this may be
federal officials at high levels," Danner said. "This is something we have
got to stop on the federal level."

Both Danner and McCarthy were in the Missouri General Assembly in 1993 when
state laws were passed to try to stop the handoffs.

John Dady, a Republican, called for Congress to repeal the 1984 federal law
that allowed the handoffs.

"When a state law enforcement agency claims ignorance of state forfeiture
laws, we should remind them as they do the citizens that ignorance of the
law is not an excuse," Dady said.

State Sen. Sam Graves, a Tarkio Republican, and Teresa Loar, a Kansas City
councilwoman and Republican, said more funding needed to be provided to law
enforcement to halt the practice.

Several other 6th District candidates, including Republican Jeff Bailey and
Democrat Sandra Reeves, agreed that remedies needed to be found to stop
police from evading state laws.

To reach Karen Dillon, projects reporter, call (816) 234-4430 or send
e-mail to kdillon@kcstar.com