Cops Now Using A New Device Allowing Them To Steal Cash From Innocent Citizens Like An ATM…(Stay Out Of Oklahoma!)
By Claire Bernish
ActivistPost.com
JUNE 8, 2016
As if civil asset forfeiture, where police can seize your property without having to prove you actually committed a crime, wasn’t contentious enough already, a new device allows the Oklahoma Highway Patrol to steal money directly from your bank account — on the spot.
And it’s already in use.
The Electronic Recovery and Access to Data Machine, known by the acronym ERAD, can scan your bank account and prepaid cards, giving OHP instant access to the balance — and the funds — if a trooper believes the money is tied to a crime. OHP rolled out 16 ERAD devices in May, and unsurprisingly, has already employed the technology.
You don’t even have to be charged with a crime to be a victim of these badge-wearing armed robbers — which makes OHP’s new ERAD device an astonishing prospect.
“We’re gonna look for different factors in the way that you’re acting,” Oklahoma Highway Patrol Lt. John Vincent told local News 9. “We’re gonna look for if there’s a difference in your story. If there’s some way that we can prove that you’re falsifying information to us about your business.”
What Vincent seems to be saying is OHP will try its damnedest to find a reason to rob you at gunpoint.
“If you can prove that you have a legitimate reason to have that money it will be given back to you. And we’ve done that in the past,” Vincent added.
This reasoning turns the very concept of innocent until proven guilty on its head. And State Sen. Kyle Loveless said cases where police abused this new system have already come to light, including single mothers, a cancer survivor who had their medication seized, a Christian band, and a number of other completely innocent people.
“We’ve seen where the money goes and how it’s misspent,” Loveless said.
In fact, this is intensified policing for profit. News 9 obtained a copy of the contract between the state and ERAD Group, Inc., which shows Oklahoma paying “$5,000 for the software and scanners, then 7.7 percent of all the cash the highway patrol seizes.”
But law enforcement obstinately claims this isn’t about the money.
The Rest…HERE
