Hacker News Reader

Because that's how they manufacture probable cause. If they can manufacture probable cause, they can search the car for things that are valuable enough to justify the paperwork.

There's a scene in "True Detective" season 1, where one of sheriff's in the show is driving a Maserati to the country club he golfs at, and says he, "Seized it off some good old boy last year." I'd been aware of civil forfeiture for years before seeing that show, but just the way it was presented really stuck with me for some reason; just how much the system can be abused by "bad actors."

> And it gets worse again.

Of course! We could go on for ages.

And if you want to go on for ages, I recommend Reason, the strident Libertarian rag — not because I want to be a cheerleader for the libertarians (ick) but because they've been covering this topic since March 1989 (!) (!!) (!!!) (but more regularly and in more depth since 2007.)

Lots of fun reading awaits you: https://reason.com/tag/civil-asset-forfeiture/