UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. $8,000.00 UNITED STATES CURRENCY
Filing
12
OPINION ON FORFEITURE. The money will not be forfeited. The government must return the money to its legal owner, Ryan Lorenzo Barnes.(Signed by Judge Lynn N. Hughes) Parties notified.(amwilliams, 4)
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
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The United States of America,
Plaintiff,
'Versus
$8,000 in Currency,
Defendant.
Civil Action H-I4-3440
Opinion on Forfeiture
1.
Introduction.
The government has converted the temporary air-safety inspection into a search for
crime in general. It may not assume facts to support its seizing $ 8 ,000 from a law-abiding man.
It says that it is money from a drug deal and that the man was a courier. Because the
government has no facts - nothing - from which the agents could have reasonably concluded
that the money was the proceeds of a drug deal, much less that the passenger was a courier, it
will be returned to the citizen.
2.
Background.
OnJuly 18,2014, Ryan Lorenzo Barnes was traveling by air from Orlando, Florida, to
SanJose, California - a domestic flight. He landed at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental
Airport to change planes for SanJose.
Before he arrived, the Drug Enforcement Administration told local police about a
possible courier traveling from Orlando to SanJose with drugs or money. This was the data.
No name, description, flight, or looks. Nothing. Orlando has 2.3 million people living there,
and its airport handles 37 million passengers a year. SanJose has 1.4 million residents, and its
airport handles nearly one million passengers a year.
When Barnes stepped off the plane in Houston, officers of the Houston Police
Department's High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Task Force were waiting. The officers
asked him for his boarding pass. Barnes gave it to them. The officers then asked for his
identification. Barnes produced it. The officers asked if he had drugs or money with him. He
said that he did not have drugs but that he had around $7,000. The officers then asked him to
come with them to their office in another terminal. Barnes complied.
The police say that during this initial colloquy, Barnes became very nervous. They say
that his hands shook; he would not maintain eye contact with them; he fumbled with his wallet
in getting his identification.
In their office, the police interrogated Barnes. They asked him why he was traveling to
SanJose. The officers say that he first told them that he was going to visit his sister, whose
address he did not know. Later he said that he was going to a party and that he would use the
money for it. The officers say that he did not know the occasion for the party. Finally he told
the officers that he was going to buy a wrecker with the money.
The officers searched their databases for Barnes's criminal history. They learned that
he had been arrested three times on drug charges. The officers then called for a dog to check
the backpack. The dog alerted. The officers searched his backpack and found $8,000 but no
drugs. The government kept Barnes's $ 8,000 and sent him on his way. It says that the money
was traceable to a drug deal. It has asked the court to forfeit the money.
3.
I
Forfciturc.
The government says that Barnes's money should be forfeited because it is traceable to
an exchange for a controlled substance. 2
\\!hen pressed, the government could not identify a single transaction to which the
money was connected. A bureaucratic tip that it was possible that a courier would be traveling
from Orlando to SanJose may be true - may be true everyday. It is not a shadow of evidence
that Barnes was one. The tip did not identify anyone with specificity and clearly not Barnes. It
described his itinerary. It did not identify a specific transaction that involved his money. It
amounted to nothing more than the officers' bare assertion that the money was drug proceeds.
The only fact that could connect the money to drugs is the alert by the dog. The alert,
however, is worthless. Most currency in the United States - 92.% - has traces of controlled
I
I8 U.s.c. § 98 r.
2
2.I
U.s.c. § 88r.
substances. It has trace drugs because a little money that may have been part of a drug deal gets
deposited with other cash; when the tainted bills are sorted and counted, they leave traces of
drugs on the machine. A bartender who sells a drink to someone with tainted bills mixes them
with his other cash. The dog's alert only tends to show that the currency had been in
circulation. 3 The dog's reliability was not established.
The government makes much of Barnes's demeanor and inability to give acceptable
answers to its questions. This too proves little. Being nervous when ambushed by several
officers is normal. It would be remarkable if Barnes were calm. That he did not maintain eye
contact proves nothing. The officers would just as likely have pointed to his maintaining eye
contact and watching them closely as evidence of his guilt.
Beyond his name, Barnes was not obliged to tell the officers anything. He could have
kept quiet or told them that he was traveling to the moon to buy his cat a birthday present.
Though he likely did not think himself able, Barnes could also have declined to speak with the
officers and continued to his connecting flight. It makes no difference. Inconsistent or incredible
explanations for his travel do not show that the money was connected to drugs or that he is a
courier of drugs or money.
The tip did not hint at a name for the courier. Once Barnes told them his name, they
looked on their computers to discover that he had been convicted of drug crimes. His record
is not present data to support an arrest or a seizure. His confused, even evasive, answers do not
justify his detention or keeping the money. He is not obliged to have a reasonable explanation
of his life available for the police. He gave them his name, an identity card, his boarding pass,
and told them about the money. They sicced the dog on his money. They took him to a remote
place for this additional interrogation. Barnes had a flight to catch. If they caused him to miss
it, they were not going to help him explain it to the airline.
The most damning evidence of his money's guilt is the fact that after the police had
seized it, they let Barnes go. He was never connected to a drug deal. They did not give him so
much as a warning - no citation, arrest, charge. They did not call the DEA, SanJose police, or
others to tell them what had happened or to keep an eye on Barnes. They were content with
his money.
3 Amanda]. Jenkins,
Int'l 189 (2001).
Drug Contamination of
us Paper Currcn9',
121
Forensic Sci.
The intrusions of the Transportation Safcry Administration are constitutionally
tolerable only temporarily and only for defense against terrorism. The DEA and local police turn
the safety-check opportunity into a general inquiry for crimes. TSA has no legitimate interest
in whether or how much money passengers have - neither does the Houston Police.
The government's actions resemble those of common brigands preying on people who
use airways. No, the officers do not keep the money; their reward is the booty of approval,
assignments, and promotion. The Drug Enforcement Administration may bureaucratically
disburse forfeited money to cooperative police departments. Seizing property and then, at
significant cost, obliging its owner to prove a negative to reclaim what all along is legally his.
4.
Posture.
The government initially sought to forfeit Barnes's money administratively. Barnes
claimed the money. Before it sued here, the government asked Barnes, through his lawyer, to
answer questions, including - among several others - details about his supposed purchase of
a wrecker, why he wanted to buy one in SanJose instead of Orlando, and why he was going to
pay in cash instead of a certified check. The government simply has no business asking these
questions. It must show that the money may be forfeited, not force Barnes to explain his
preference for a particular medium of exchange.
After Barnes did not answer, the government sued here. The government published
notice of this suit on its website, www.forfeiture.gov. The website - one of seven maintained
by the government for this purpose - is a little-known, unreadable list of funds and dates. It has
more than seven hundred pages oflistings. It did not, however, notify Barnes directly.4 When
the government takes property from a person, it must take enough data from him to enable it
to notify him when it decides to keep his money. This the government usually avoids doing.
Seized money is not abandoned or unclaimed; it is a known person's stuff. The process that is
due Barnes is notice and an opportunity to be heard. 5 Barnes has not appeared and has not
claimed the money here - proof of the efficacy of the notice by publication. Perhaps, as the
officers knew, the cost of his hiring a lawyer or coming back or both would exceed the value of
4 Supp. R. (G) (4) (b) (i).
5
United States v.James Daniel Good Real Property, 510 U.s. 43, 4 8 (1993);
Grannis v. Ordean, 234 U.s. 38 5, 394 (19 14).
the money. Police work has generated an expression: You can beat the rap but you can't beat
the ride. Lawmen of integrity and courage are having their character subverted by a management
too eager for statistics, press, budgets, and corner-cutting.
Nevertheless, the court is obliged to ensure that the government does not abuse its
power. Because the government has not given facts from which the court might reasonably
conclude that Barnes's money was probably connected to a drug transaction, the court will
dismiss the government's complaint on its own motion.
5.
Conclusion.
The government had no justification for having seiz;ed Barnes's money. This case is a
telling example of overz;ealous policing, taking cues from slipshod sister agencies. The police
have a hard job. The Constitution commands that they do their work correctly. Government
may not become banditti for law and order. 6 The money will not be forfeited. The government
must return the money to its legal owner, Ryan Lorenz;o Barnes.
Signed on August 26,2015, at Houston, Texas.
Lynn N. Hughes
United States DistrictJudge
6
Leonard W. Levy, A License to Steal: The Forfeiture of Pro perry (1995).
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