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You may have heard of civil asset forfeiture.
That's where police can seize your property and cash without first proving you committed a crime; without a warrant and without arresting you, as long as they suspect that your property is somehow tied to a crime.
Now, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol has a device that also allows them to seize money in your bank account or on prepaid cards.
It's called an ERAD, or Electronic Recovery and Access to Data machine, and state police began using 16 of them last month.
Here's how it works. If a trooper suspects you may have money tied to some type of crime, the highway patrol can scan any cards you have and seize the money.
"We're gonna look for different factors in the way that you're acting," Oklahoma Highway Patrol Lt. John Vincent said. "We're gonna look for if there's a difference in your story. If there's some way that we can prove that you're falsifying information to us about your business."
...
News 9 obtained a copy of the contract with the state.
It shows the state is paying ERAD Group Inc., $5,000 for the software and scanners, then 7.7 percent of all the cash the highway patrol seizes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 09 2016, @06:06PM
True, but that's highly inefficient. The foot solders won't have any orders to follow if the criminal order-givers are killed in a defensive war.
Government behavior is typically inefficient and stupid, but it can be informative. Take note of all the "decapitation attack" attempts the US gov has used against others for decades - it's one thing they know works on them, so they idiotically assume it works on everyone else.
It's been said that criminal governments will fight to the last dead cop, FBI agent, soldier, etc.; will they fight to the first dead senator, second propaganda publisher, or third head bureaucrat?