We do this now for many crimes, though just to the agency level and not the individual officer. It is called asset forfeiture and is a civil process by which evidence of certain crimes, and the proceeds of them, are seized and turned over to the agency that did the seizing. As a general rule, the agency splits the take with the lawyer's office that does the court hearing for the seizure (District Attorney, County Attorney, or US Attorney). There are then laws on how the money can be spent, such as on equipment for the department but not on new personnel.Molon_labe wrote:Tell you the truth why couldn't the LEO that took that drug money and weapons off the street get a small percentage of the take...then take that confiscated money and put it into the police dept funds (completely autonomous of federal or local funding)
I have a few major problems with this, not the least of which is the standards of evidence. The forfeiture is a civil thing, and the suit is named against the property itself and not the owner. This means that sometimes the owner does not even know that his property is being seized until too late. It also means that I can seize the property without being able to prove the crime (think OJ and Goldmans).
It also leads to less spending by the city on the department, which hides the real cost of the department. If I know you are averaging $100,000 per year in seizures, i can cut the budget for new cars by that amount. Then, if you have a year with less money, the police management looks incompetent for going over budget and the cops look bad for the city budget being wrong.
It also leads to corruption on how the money is spent. This is what is happening in Austin right now, as they audit the seizure funds and how it was spent. If a Chief has a fund of money that does not go through the budget process, and does not have to be accounted for in the normal budget process, he will spend some of it improperly to get something he wants.
And last, but most important, is that it leads to corruption in the law enforcement field. The departments will find cooperative officers and put them on special details to increase the seizures. They will go out and make arrests they know won't stand up in court, just to get enough to seize the car/property.
Think how easy it would be to seize a car from a CHL for a case where there was a shooting that the D.A. decided to prosecute. He could lose the shooting case, but still win the civil seizure while you are worried about your freedom. I have even seen the seizure used as part of a plea bargain, where a nice car was forfeited to get some charges dropped.