Courthouse News Service:

A Cleveland security guard claims in court that the city has refused to return his guns that were used as evidence after he shot and killed a home invader, even though the case against the intruder’s accomplice is over.

Brian Bridges sued the City of Cleveland, Mayor Frank Jackson and Police Chief Calvin Williams on Thursday in the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, alleging violations of his Second and Fourth Amendment rights.

In March 2015, Bridges came home to find two men robbing his house. During the ensuing confrontation, Bridges fatally shot one of the invaders, Joseph Eason.

“The shooting was in self defense and was justifiable,” Bridges’ lawsuit states.

The other suspect, Anthony Akins-Daniels, escaped, but he was eventually found and arrested. He pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter for causing the death of his “best friend,” Eason.

Bridges claims Cleveland police unlawfully seized his property, “including a Glock 21 semiautomatic handgun, ammunition, holsters and a redcherry piccolo,” to be used as evidence in Akins-Daniels’ case.

Despite the fact that the criminal proceedings against Akins-Daniels are over, police have not returned Bridges’ guns, he says.

Bridges noted in his complaint that he is a professional security guard and has a license to carry a concealed handgun.

He sued for replevin and violation of the Second and Fourth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

Bridges seeks $20,000 in compensatory damages and $50,000 in punitive damages. He also wants an injunction to stop the city from “enforcing any policy and/or actions that infringe upon a lawful gun owner’s right to keep and bear arms.”

The temptation of any attorney is to play up the ideas that (a) he’s a “guard,” he (b) has a permit, and (c) he was exonerated.

None of those things matter.  What matters is that asset forfeiture and seizure, even if supported by existing laws, are immoral.  They reek of royal ownership of personal property, and thus don’t even consider that a war was fought over just such things.

The owners of property, even if convicted in court, should get a chance to sell their property, give it to their family, or otherwise dispose of it in any way they deem appropriate.  It’s theirs.  Their property doesn’t belong to the state, to the king or queen, or to society at large.

This is one reason I oppose the modern concept of incarceration, as well as the notion and phrase that any man has a “debt to society” that must be paid.  No man has a debt to society.  If he has stolen he has a debt to the victim.  If he murders, rapes or kidnaps, he should be put to death.

Here’s a quick note to lawmakers everywhere.  Get rid of asset forfeiture and seizure laws.  Men’s property isn’t yours.  It doesn’t belong to you.

Detroit Free Press:

Thomas Williams was alone that November morning in 2013 when police raided his rural St. Joseph County home, wearing black masks, camouflage and holding guns at their sides. They broke down his front door with a battering ram.

“We think you’re dealing marijuana,” they told Williams, a 72-year-old, retired carpenter and cancer patient who is disabled and carries a medical marijuana card.

When he protested, they handcuffed him and left him on the living room floor as they ransacked his home, emptying drawers, rummaging through closets and surveying his grow room, where he was nourishing his 12 personal marijuana plants as allowed by law. Some had recently begun to die, so he had cloned them and had new seedlings, although they were not yet planted. That, police insisted, put him over the limit.

They did not charge Williams with a crime, though.

Instead, they took his Dodge Journey, $11,000 in cash from his home, his television, his cell phone, his shotgun and are attempting to take his Colon Township home. And they plan to keep the proceeds, auctioning off the property and putting the cash in police coffers.

More than a year later, he is still fighting to get his belongings back and to hang on to his house.

“I want to ask them, ‘Why? Why me?’ I gave them no reason to do this to me,” said Williams, who says he also suffers from glaucoma, a damaged disc in his back, and COPD, a lung disorder. “I’m out here minding my own business, and just wanted to be left alone.”

The seizure was allowed under Michigan’s Civil Asset Forfeiture laws, which allow police to take property from citizens if they suspect a crime was committed, even when there is not enough evidence to charge them. Homeowners like Williams have to prove they did not purchase their property with proceeds from criminal activity and then sue to get the property back.

Why you?  You happened to be available when the police needed to raise some revenue.  It’s that simple.  I’m so sorry for this poor man (and let me say here that I couldn’t care less that he had some hemp growing in his house, any more than I care if a man makes some untaxed corn liquor in his back yard), but these laws made by the legislature are evil.

I don’t care what this man did.  There isn’t any reason at all that the state should legally be able to confiscate possessions.  In the worst case (let’s say that a man goes to prison for murder), his possessions could be treated as if he passed away and his will invoked (his children would then inherit his possessions, or whomever was named in his will).  The advantage of this is that if he doesn’t have a will, he can be queried by the court to ascertain who he wants to inherit his belongings.

Readers may have better ideas.  Anything is better than the state taking possession of property, and I see no basis in English common law or the Holy Scriptures for such laws.