It’s not okay to take away useful tools and options from non-criminals on the basis that criminals use them. We do not ban cars on the basis that they are a tool for drive-by shootings.

Again, I would say that should depend on statistics. If a tool is misused for criminal activities in the vast majority of cases, I think you have to make some compromise on personal freedom in favor of security and law enforcement.

Not really. Marginalizing and oppressing non-criminals is not justified by a hunt for criminals. If your approach to hunting criminals harms non-criminals, you’re doing it wrong.

Isn’t that the case for many preventive security measures? I mean the baggage checks at the airport are time consuming and restrict everyone on bringing liquids, large batteries, forks, knives etc. into the plane. And I’m pretty sure, the ratio of ‘terrorists carrying bombs’ to ‘just normal people bringing their water bottle’ is significantly worse than the crime : non-crime factor in case of FedEx cash.

Same with routine controls at a border or on the highway. It’s annoying for many people due to delays just to catch some few smugglers, overloaded trucks etc.

A security camera in a bank will film thousands of regular customers before it ever (if at all) gets to see a robbery.

I fully understand that people criticise all of these measures but to be honest I have some doubts that getting rid of everything would be a smart idea.

Law enforcement by definition deals with suspects not convicted criminals. So even if we moved to a purely reactive law enforcement, your measures will still affect the innocent suspects.

The case at hand is even more perverse, as the civil forfeiture practice actually hinders enforcement of law. They do the money grab for the money. When you seize cash, you send a clear signal to criminals that they are being investigated.

That point I see as well. But wouldn’t the alternative be even worse for you from a privacy perspective? They keep the practice of scanning packages but rather than seizing the money, they send investigators after the intended recipient. That wouldn’t only dramatically increase the costs of law enforcement but also lead to innocents being supervised.

When you seize money from a tax evader a year before they evade tax by filing their fraudulent tax return, you actually sabotage the opportunity to catch them (it’s crime-prevention prevention). You can only catch them by recording the cash and letting it go, then auditing their tax using that information a year or two later.

Not all money transfers are taxable income. So if police knows that you received 10,000 in a box last year but didn’t declare it that doesn’t automatically mean you invaded taxes. The criminal could say, that it wasn’t their money and they gave it to someone else, declare it as a gift or a returned loan from a friend. They could also just say that the package was stolen from the porch and never arrived.

Furthermore, the recipient on the label may not be real person. Maybe the money is shipped to “Mr & Mrs Activist Punk” but the real criminal is waiting in front of the house to intercept the delivery.

All in all, I still think seizing big amounts of cash from deliveries is somewhat acceptable as long as…

• Police can provide statistics to underline that the practice is used by criminals in a significant manner.
• All cases are well-documented and no money is going to the policemen themselves.
• There is a reasonable limit (e.g. don’t seize 100 USD that aunt Marty sends to her nephew for his birthday).
• The sender and recipient are informed about the money being seized and have a chance to reclaim it if they can proof the legitimate background.