POLICE SEIZING HOMES, CARS, TO HIT CROOKS WHERE IT HURTS

When it comes to reducing crime, local police are not just throwing
criminals in jail, they're doing everything they can to take away
their profits as well.

With drug charges, often suspects plead guilty and put in six months
to a couple years in jail before they're back on the street and in
business again, said Sgt. Scott Rintoul, head of Burnaby RCMP's drug
section.

Taking away the homes, cars and other assets purchased with drug money
leaves them with little resources to start up again. "We're taking
their profits," said Rintoul. "That's a deterrent."

While Burnaby Mounties always look for assets that can be seized,
being able to keep them can be a long and arduous process through the
courts. As a result, Rintoul said there are some cases in the works,
but none completed in the two-and-a-half years he's held his current
position in Burnaby.

One case that is nearing completion involves a home with $400,000
worth of equity in it that had been used as a marijuana grow
operation.

Rintoul noted that officers always have to do a cost-benefit analysis
of pursing assets in court. In one case last year, they arrested a
young drug dealer who owned a condominium but decided it wasn't worth
going after because he only had about $25,000 in equity and owed
$400,000.

The main challenge with pursuing criminal forfeiture is the need not
only for the suspects to be convicted of the crime in question first,
but for police to prove the property was either directly used in
committing the crime or is in fact the proceeds of crime.

Many grow-ops are set up in rental homes, Rintoul said, so police and
Crown prosecutors need to prove the home owners actually knew what it
was being used for.

As for proceeds of crime, usually a forensic audit is required to show
that over a period of time the suspect made money from illegal
activities and used it to buy the home, cars, boats or other assets.

The federal Controlled Drugs and Substances Act has provisions for
property forfeiture under the Criminal Code. Rintoul said along with
taking the property, fines and heavier jail sentences can also be
added after the suspect is convicted.

Criminal forfeiture "has more teeth when it works."

When a criminal forfeiture case doesn't look winnable, it's often
turned over to the B.C. Civil Forfeiture Office, created in 2006 for
just such instances.

"Civil forfeiture is based on civil law, it's not about punishment,"
stressed Rob Kroeker, executive director of the provincally-run
office.

Essentially, it works through the legal principle that people cannot
gain ownership of property through unlawful means.

"That's why you don't have to get anyone convicted because it's not
about criminal liability, it's about property rights and whether you
gained legitimate title to the property or not," Kroeker explained.

If it's not acquired lawfully, the owner won't have proper title to a
property. "So therefore title falls to the government."

In civil forfeiture, all that needs to be proven is that the property
is the proceeds of crime or has been used in an illegal way, such as a
house used for a grow-op.

Since 2006, the office has concluded about 179 files, everything from
cash, houses, and cars to jewelry. After deducting legal fees,
outstanding mortgages and other costs, that's resulted in a net
benefit of $14 million.

"It's preventative. It's taking the economic incentive away from
criminal activity," Kroeker said. "This is $14 million that would have
stayed in the criminal economy but for civil forfeiture."

Burnaby does figure in two significant civil forfeiture cases. It is
home to the only case in B.C. that has gone to trial instead of
settling out of court. The trial concluded recently and is awaiting a
judge's decision.

It involves three houses in a row on Boundary Road that the office
alleges were used as grow-ops. No one was found in the homes when
police shut down the grow-ops.

"The landlord says they were all rented and our allegation is he was
aware of what was going on," Kroeker said.

"If I let you set up a grow-op on my property, I may as well be doing
it myself. And then, where's the rent coming from?"

Burnaby is also the location of the most valuable property the office
has seized to date-a home in Capitol Hill worth about $1.3 million
when forfeited in 2007. That was a straight proceeds of crime case,
where the house was purchased through profits from drug dealing.

Kroeker said occasionally his office has dealt with cases of nuisance
properties, where police have been called hundreds of times over a
three-year period for everything from drug dealing and prostitution to
assaults. "We can help out in those cases."

As for the money generated by civil forfeitures, it funds the work of
the civil forfeiture office and in some cases, is shared with victims
of the unlawful activity, according to the province.

Money raised through criminal forfeitures goes to the federal
government, mostly to the justice system but also to drug treatment
and prevention programs, said Rintoul.

"It's not like our tax dollars pay for this, the program pays for
itself."