Steemit Community Asks A Cop! Round 1 Answers

Thank you to @eonwarped and @rt395 who submitted really great questions.

(art by @rubenalexander)

Let's start with @eonwarped who asked three questions:

1. Any of these people you pursue end up using cryptocurrency? And does that complicate anything?

I've only conducted one investigation where cryptocurrency was being used. During the investigation, I found out the person was using Bitcoin to purchase large amounts of ecstasy from Europe via Alphabay. I ended up seizing five thousand ecstasy pills and two pounds of MDMA from that persons home. This was about two years ago and we didn't even think to check on his laptop for wallets or anything, we just didn't have the knowledge at that time. They also had over $100k in cash we seized as proceeds of the illegal narcotics sales.

I work closely with the DEA and FBI and they have issued statements about the process of detecting and seizing cryptocurrency wallets involved in illegal activity. In my professional opinion, the federal government has been slow to adopt procedures for handling this issue. I don't know if it is not being used frequently for illegal means or why, but I do know they are taking significant action now to look into cryptocurrency as a means of financing crime.

Local municipalities on the other hand, have virtually no capability of understanding or investigating cryptocurrencies at this time. It may be several years, in my opinion, before they begin looking into cryptocurrencies.

Cryptocurrency absolutely complicates things. Working large scale narcotics cases, I mostly target Mexican and S. American trafficking organizations that move multiple (100s) of kilograms worth of narcotics. They ALWAYS use cash, so it is much easier to find. If they were to switch to cryptocurrency it would nearly be impossible to detect the money UNLESS we knew the wallet address or knew where the money originated in U.S. banks. The only way I could guess we would know this would be if we had a confidential informant and those don't come often from the cartel. In my opinion, cryptocurrencies help illegal money flow through the system undetected in our current system. I'm not opposed to this, it's just a bi-product of decentralization. The FBI has shown, with the dismantling of the Silk Road, that the money can be tracked but I don't see it filtering down to the local levels of law enforcement. The resources are just not there yet.

1. How has the generally negative police sentiment affected the job?

The negative police sentiment has done two things to policing. It has caused police men and women to retreat further into an "us" vs "them" mentality. More than ever, police have had to watch their backs and fear outright assassination from citizens. The response to this is that most police have become less proactive and as a result crime increases.

The other thing that has resulted is the people who actually support and stand by the police are more visible. They don't hesitate to let you know they are behind the police and offer to contribute in small ways which is nice to know the people are still appreciative and not everyone is against us.

1. What kind of things warrant filling a police report? Specifically, is there a bar where you know that the report will be so low priority it will be thrown in the trash and laughed at? (One example comes to mind is a friend that got IRS phone scammed into buying gift cards)

I always tell people if they want a police report, no matter the trivial nature, to get one. It's our job to document anything the public wants. I can't tell you how many times I've written police reports for people when no actual crime has even occurred.

In my opinion, get a police report when a crime personally impacts you. For instance, property theft, identity theft, assault, etc.

As far as crimes that won't be investigated, nearly all the fraud calls would be a start. There isn't any way, on the local level, to even start an investigation especially since those calls originate overseas.

Police get called on dispute cases between roomates, between family, and between customer/store owners. In these situations, it is mostly always civil disputes and there is nothing we can do other than mediate. For instance, people have called because they get to the register at a store and they claim the price of an item is $1.00 on the shelf but gets rang up as $2 and the owner won't change it. Another would be they go to a gas station and claim they gave the attendant a $20 bill but get change as if they gave the attendant a $10 bill.

For some reason, the police have become the de facto parents in a lot of areas where the actual parents will call on their kids because the kid won't listen to them. I've written reports about 12-13 year old kids yelling at their parents because they won't let them have a facebook account. I've written reports for mentally ill people who claim the government is listening to them with secret devices embedded in their walls.

Great questions @eonwarped, I hoped I answered them to your satisfaction!

@rt395 asked:

What is your opinion of "asset forfeiture"?

This is a really great question and it probably deserves it's own post which I may make if anyone is interested.

Quickly, for those that don't know, [civil] asset forfeiture is the process where police "seize" asset(s) from an individual or a company suspected of illegal activity. The person or company doesn't necessarily need to be charged with any crime but merely suspected which has caused controversy, rightly so.

It is handled in civil court so a person can be arrested and ultimately found not guilty or the charges dropped in criminal court but the asset(s) still lost in the civil judgement.

It was originally started to dismantle large drug organizations but has recently overflowed to ordinary citizens violating their 4th & 5th amendment rights.

Side note: my stance on drugs is that many of them should be legalized. I target drug dealers as operating an illegal business. My outlook is that if I have to pay taxes, then they should too until a better system is created but that's above my pay grade and a totally different conversation.

In my opinion and personal experience, like other laws, it has its good and bad. Doing what I do, I have seen first hand it dismantle drug organizations. The argument has been made that by seizing all their money and vehicles we are essentially hindering their defense of the criminal charges. I can't really say for certain if this is true or not but it is a great argument against it. What I know to be true from my experience is that nearly all the people who've I've arrested for trafficking narcotics have had high powered lawyers on retainer and by me seizing what money I've found they've still received the best representation from what I can tell.

The times where we've taken money from people without arresting them, I believe, were justified. For instance, we received information through a confidential informant that someone had called them looking to buy a kilogram of cocaine and asked if they knew anyone. The informant, called us and gave us all the details that they knew. We were able to find the people and lawful conduct a search of the vehicle they were in. We found over $30k in cash in a backpack inside the vehicle. It was actually the exact amount of a kilogram of cocaine at the time. They also had about 8 "burner" phones in the car. We ran a criminal history on them and they had extensive prior drug trafficking charges. They both had different stories as to where the money came from. They were from out of town and both had different explanations on where they were going and what they were doing there. We took the money based on all the above red flags, but we don't just take it and keep it. It goes into a fund where it is held until a judge rules. It is the responsibility to the owner of the money to come to court and prove where the money came from.

Now, if it were legal money, like from the sale of a house, stock returns, sale of a car, etc... a normal person would have some form of paper trail indicating where the money came from. These guys couldn't and the money was awarded to the department.

In a nutshell this is how it works. I don't see it being around much longer. While I agree that it works when it is supposed to, I acknowledge that it has run amok lately. I'm sure in a short time there will be a requirement that charges actually being filed under criminal law for property to be seized.

Great question from @rt395, I hope that I answered it thoroughly.

I'll be opening for more questions in two weeks. In the meantime, if there is something you'd like me to explore or have a question, please don't hesitate to ask. This has been a great experience for me and I appreciate the two who participated.