BILL SEEKS TO CLARIFY WHO GETS DRUG LOOT

Last March, the Arkansas Highway Police seized $3.17 million in cash found
in a tractor-trailer at a weigh station near West Memphis. The money was
seized because it appeared to bear narcotics residue. The large amount of
cash involved in the seizure has been a catalyst for the introduction of
Senate Bill 555 by Sen. Wayne Dowd, D-Texarkana. His bill seeks to resolve
some of the conflict between state and federal authorities over which
entity gets the booty in such seizures and how the seized assets are recorded.

"There's an uneasiness I sense among legislators about the high dollar
amount and volume of some of these cash and property forfeitures going on
around here," Dowd said last week. "It just doesn't seem to be kept up with
well." He also said there are different interpretations among law
enforcement agencies as to who gets the money and property.

State law says the seizing entity keeps up to $250,000. Any remainder goes
to a state fund to be distributed in local law enforcement grants by the
Arkansas Drug and Alcohol Abuse Coordinating Council. Dowd said some
entities interpret that to mean $250,000 per defendant in a case, which can
lessen the amount going to the state fund if the case has multiple defendants.

He also claimed that agencies are taking the cases to federal court so they
can keep more of the forfeited amount. Dowd said if the federal government
is involved, it takes 15 percent and the local entity can keep 85 percent.
That arrangement also leaves the state fund high and dry. SB 555 would
prohibit transfer of property seized by state or local agencies unless a
circuit judge orders it.

"It ain't going to stop it, but it at least makes it be done publicly,"
Dowd said. North Little Rock Police Chief William Nolan said his agency
does a lot of forfeitures through the federal government.

"The federal government has a very easy system, and a lot of cases are made
with the federal government," he said.

Nolan said the department takes in $100,000 to $120,000 a year in
forfeitures. To Nolan's knowledge, no local or state agency has had a
seizure exceeding the $250,000 cap in state court.

He said he was not familiar enough with the bill to state an opinion. Dowd
and co-sponsor Sen. Jim Hill, D-Nashville, became involved in the issue two
years ago after they sought to find money to upgrade the State Crime
Laboratory and to set up a regional crime lab at Hope. "We felt like raking
a little money off of these forfeitures would help solve that problem,"
Dowd said. "We tried to redistribute that a little, and law enforcement
just came unglued, including these rural counties where we were trying to
put some of the money. It's beyond me." He said the forfeited assets are
supposed to go for drug-fighting expend itures. Instead, the money is being
used at times to free county and city revenues for other purposes.

"It ain't going to fight drugs, it's going to pay for the local police
operation," he said.

Nolan said that's not the case with his department. "It doesn't supplant
the budget," he said. "We are only allowed to pay for things not budgeted.
We can't pay for officers or squad cars because those are in the budget."

Another problem SB 555 seeks to address is keeping track of the seized
assets. Dowd said current audit trails are "just terrible." "They turn in
inventory maybe weeks after a seizure," he said. "It winds up forfeited.
The forfeiture order is not quite the same as the original seizure
inventory and money gets counted wrong. It's weird." Nolan said his
department sets up a separate fund and follows strict guidelines with its
forfeiture money.

Dowd said he has heard stories of prosecutors using forfeited vehicles for
personal use.

Part of the problem is with the structure of drug task forces. The task
forces are not a legal entity, but are made up of officers from local and
state forces who work together.

Judges can't assign vehicles and other property to the task force, so
"nobody's accountable for the car. You go back three years and say 'Where's
the car?' 'Well, so and so had it and now he works in California,' " Dowd
said. The bill would require the seizing authority to file an inventory
report within 48 hours, signed by the officer and the person from whom they
are taking the property. The agency must file a petition for forfeiture
within 60 days of the seizure.

If a person claims he doesn't know anything about the seized property, as
the truck driver did in the West Memphis case, the prosecutor can release
the person and sign a forfeiture order. Dowd's bill would put an end to
that practice. He said no one's property should be taken without a judge's
order.