In a striking example of policing for profit, an Illinois prosecutor created his own police force and financed its operations with highway shakedowns. Using the state’s civil forfeiture laws, which allow law enforcement to seize—and keep—property even if the owner has never been criminally charged, the LaSalle County State’s Attorney Felony Enforcement (SAFE) Unit confiscated more than $1.7 million from drivers.
But on June 29, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that this drug squad should have never even existed. This decision sets an important precedent to hold law enforcement accountable and rolls back civil forfeiture in a state notorious for abusive seizures.
The SAFE unit dates back to 2011, when Brian Towne, then the State’s Attorney for LaSalle County (which has just over 110,000 people), created the agency to patrol Interstate 80. He swore several veteran state troopers as “special investigators,” equipping them with traffic warning and citation booklets as well as Ford Explorers kitted with emergency lights and video cameras. Whenever a SAFE investigator stopped a driver, he would immediately alert a canine unit so that a drug dog could be on-site (and sniff the car) within minutes.
In the roughly four years it operated, the SAFE Unit arrested 77 people for drug offenses, with nearly 90 percent of those cases related to marijuana. The agency also filed more than 50 civil forfeiture cases, while almost half “were not tied to a criminal charge.”
The unit then funneled forfeiture funds to cover many of its operating expenses, including weaponry, vehicles, office furniture, and uniforms. According to an investigation by Chicago Lawyer, forfeiture even paid the salaries for the very investigators responsible for the seizures: Two special investigators each collected nearly $140,000 by working for the SAFE unit over the years.
Towne and other employees also spent over $95,000 in confiscated money to travel to conferences, including two trips to Las Vegas. Those funds covered all expenses, including hotel accommodations and airfare, as well as $17,000 in per diem payments. full story
