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Massachusetts is an outlier when it comes to civil forfeiture laws

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The civil asset forfeiture system allows police and prosecutors to take and keep money and property they suspect is part of a drug crime.

Many states have eased their civil forfeiture laws, but in Massachusetts, prosecutors are able to keep seized assets using a lower legal bar than in any other state.

Shannon Dooling of WBUR reports.

This story was a collaboration with ProPublica and was supported by the Pulitzer Center. 

This article was originally published on WBUR.org.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

In Massachusetts, trying to get one’s money back is so onerous, legal experts say it may violate due process rights under the U.S. Constitution. (Sophie Morse for WBUR)
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In Massachusetts, trying to get one’s money back is so onerous, legal experts say it may violate due process rights under the U.S. Constitution. (Sophie Morse for WBUR)

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