The
IRS Has Been Holding This Guy's $447,000 For 2 Years, And He's Never Been
Charged With A Crime - (www.businessinsider.com) More
than two years ago, the IRS used a controversial policy known as civil forfeiture to empty the bank account of a small
business owned by three Long Island brothers. The brothers, Jeff, Mitch, and
Rich Hirsch, haven't even been charged with a crime. But the IRS is holding
their $446,651 hostage while they struggle to run their convenience-store
distribution business without that cash. "We're very angry about
this," Jeff, 55, said recently over the phone. "I think it's wrong,
especially when you do nothing wrong, and you can prove you've done nothing
wrong, and they still have your money." The process of civil forfeiture
allows the government — often the police, but in this case, the IRS — to seize
money thought to have been obtained illegally. The IRS has been seizing funds
it believes were deposited in an illegal way. Banks must report deposits of over $10,000 to the federal government. Anybody who makes repeated deposits of just
under $10,000 specifically to avoid this requirement is guilty of a crime
called restructuring (also
known as "smurfing").
Immigration
officer union sounds alarm over DHS order for millions of blank work permits,
green cards - (www.foxnews.com) A
union that represents thousands of federal immigration officers is raising
alarm after the U.S. government ordered supplies to create millions of blank
work permits and green cards, touching off speculation that the Obama
administration may be preparing executive action on immigration. The
Associated Press reported last week that the new federal contract proposal from
the Homeland Security Department would allow the government to buy enough supplies
to make as many as 34 million immigrant work permits and residency cards over
the next five years. Though the Obama administration now says the proposal is
unrelated to any executive action, the move raised concerns the administration
is preparing for a surge of work permit applications from illegal
immigrants. Kenneth Palinkas, the president of the National Citizenship
and Immigration Services Council, said in a press release Monday that he
believes the move indicates the administration is planning to enact “massive
unilateral amnesty” after the midterm elections.
IPO
That Brought In $1 Billion in March Implodes in Denmark - (www.bloomberg.com) Denmark’s
second-biggest initial public offering since 2010 has just imploded. OW Bunker A/S (OW), which provides fuel to the marine industry,
said it couldn’t persuade its bankers to give it the cash it needs to keep
doing business. That followed an announcement last night revealing senior OW
Bunker employees in Singapore committed fraud, costing as much as $125 million.
The company, whose shares have been suspended since yesterday, now says
investors need to assume that its equity has been wiped out as it files for an
in-court restructuring. Just eight months ago, investors were lining up, eager
to throw their money into an IPO that valued the company at almost $1 billion
and then drove its shares up 21 percent in their first day of trading. Nordea Bank AB (NDA), which helped arrange the sale and has been
urging clients to buy OW Bunker shares since Oct. 24 until suspending its
recommendation today, says it’s “shocked” by the company’s subsequent collapse.
Those
Sunspots Approaching Earth Could Bring Blackouts - (www.bloomberg.com) A
new group of sunspots that has come into view of Earth has the attention of the
U.S. Space Weather Prediction Center. The area, referred to as 2205, spat out an
x-ray flare that produced a moderate radio blackout today, according to the
center’s website. Earlier this week, it let loose several coronal mass
ejections, explosions of magnetic fields and plasma from the sun’s atmosphere
that can knock out power grids and disrupt navigational systems. Most of the
material in today’s flare, along with the earlier eruptions, was pointed away
from Earth, thus sparing the planet severe storms. “We’re kind of seeing a bit
of resurgence now,” said Robert Rutledge, lead operations at the center. “The
sun is making a second run at us.”
How
A Small, Family-Owned Company Taught Cops Around America To Seize Millions In
Cash - (www.businessinsider.com) A
controversial police tactic that lets cops seize large amounts of
suspicious cash has
been aided by a family-owned company that won millions in federal contracts, Robert O'Harrow and Michael Sallah write in The Washington
Post.
That company, Desert Snow,
has trained cops around the US on the art of roadside asset forfeiture, which
allows police to take cash or other assets they believe have been illegally
obtained. Cops can take these assets from people even if they're never
convicted of or even charged with a crime, and people must go to court to get
their stuff back. In five years, cops trained by Desert Snow seized $427
million from motorists stopped on America's highways, the Post found. The
company, which retired
California Highway Patrol veteran Joe David started in his garage in 1989, eventually won federal contracts
worth $2.5 million from the Department of Homeland Security, the Justice
Department, and other agencies, according to the Post. David's wife and
kids still work there, and the contractor employs about 75 instructors and administrators (though it's unclear how many, if any of
these instructors work there full-time).
Here
Are The Ridiculous Things Cops Bought With Cash 'Seized' From Americans - (www.businessinsider.com)
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