Disabled veteran Johnny L. Davis Jr. says when he reported his truck was stolen to police, they seized it in a process called civil asset forfeiture.
Civil asset forfeiture lets the government seize, keep or sell any property (money, guns, cars etc.) that are supposedly involved in a crime.
If the owner of the property wasn't involved in a crime, police can still seize the property.
"You always hear elected officials saying, in this country, it is the rule of law, the law rules, and that's a lie" says Davis.
Former Georgia state representative Scott Turner is the executive director of Eternal Vigilance Action, a nonprofit that advocates for policies like civil asset forfeiture reform.
Turner says he believes civil asset forfeiture is unconstitutional.
"This is about the American promise that you are innocent until proven guilty by a jury of your peers, and that you should not be punished until you have been found guilty. Civil asset forfeiture turns that on its head, it says we're going to take your stuff from you. And if you're not guilty, then we're still going to take your stuff from you" says Turner.
The Institute for Justice gave Georgia a D- for the state's civil forfeiture laws in 2020.
According to the institute, in Georgia, law enforcement can keep up to 100% of the money earned when they sell the items they seize, leaving some concerned about that money possibly being manipulated.
Chantel Mullen with the Georgia Advisory Committee to the U.S Commission on Civil Rights was part of a study entitled Civil Asset Forfeiture and its Impact on Communities of Color in Georgia.
She says community advocates found that civil asset forfeiture made the relationship between "the community and police officers worse, not necessarily better."
“The police officers also benefit on the back end because if they keep it, it is something that is used in their department, and there are some departments that are actually using this to supplement their budgets," says Chantel Mullen, Chair - Georgia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
We started digging into how the departments in our North Georgia area seize property and report them.
Chief Deputy Tommy Bradford with the Dade County Sheriffs Office says his department is focused on transparency.
"You know, some people feel like it's [civil asset forfeiture] being abused. I don't think that's here. Am I gonna say it’s somewhere? Maybe? But it's not here" says Bradford.
Bradford tells us Dade County's most common seizure is money from drug busts.
To hold departments accountable for what they seize, the state requires them to report it.
The Prosecuting Attorneys' Council of Georgia says law enforcement agencies submit reports to them, they approve or reject them and send them on to the Carl Vinson Institute of Government at UGA.
That agency maintains the database.
We searched for reports from several departments in our viewing area on that database and found documents missing from Trenton, Rossville, Cohutta, Dade and Walker counties.
We took our questions directly to the agencies.
"I've got records where I've done it, but for some reason, it's not online. And I don't know if it's something that I've done wrong, or if it's something through the system, that's just not right" says Bradford.
Chief Deputy Bradford admits that the department was missing civil asset forfeiture documents for 2 years but he says since he's been in his position, they've always submitted their documents.
According to the Prosecuting Attorney's Council of Georgia, Dade County submitted a report by the deadline of January 31 this year, however, because it only contained one page it was rejected.
PACGA says on March 27 of this year, Dade County submitted a report for 2021 and on April 15, submitted a report for 2022.
At Walker County Sheriff’s Office, a representative told us "I am not sure why this information is not available to view on their website. The requested information was sent to them at the appropriate time every year."
According to the Prosecuting Attorney's Council of Georgia, Walker County’s reports for 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022 were attached to an email submitted directly to PACGA staff on April 11, 2023.
Since our investigation, many of the documents can now be found here.
Somewhere in between lies a lapse in the communication. Some reform advocates blame the documentation system.
"We look at the Carl Vinson Institute's website, which is where this is all supposed to be housed and it's a mishmash, and it's PDFs that are not searchable. You can't collect the data very easily. You can't sort the data at all, you have to find that exact law enforcement agency, and sometimes a department within that agency will report differently. And it's not uniform." says Scott Turner.
Former State representative Scott Turner supports legislation trying to reform the process by allowing individuals who were not convicted of a crime to receive their property back.
House Bills 106, 109 and 110would create a way for an individual to retrieve their vehicle that was used in a crime if the vehicle was driven by a defendant without the owner’s consent, exempt certain types of property from seizure and require the University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government to establish and maintain a tracking system and searchable public website that lists property seized by law enforcement in Georgia.
"The data is is vitally important. So we can get a handle on how is it actually being used and if it there are instances of abuse, it would be the first way that we could keep people accountable, says Turner.
It will also be a way to enforce transparency between police agencies and the community.
"Speaking for me, we're not in this business to make money, we're in this business that enforces the law" says Chief Deputy Tommy Bradford.
MORE:
We asked the Cohutta Police Department why they had missing civil asset forfeiture reports with the state for the years 2019, 2020 and 2021, they told us:
"We didn’t file any reports those years due to not having any forfeitures. We have reached out to the Georgia Prosecuting Attorney’s Council who is the agency we report to for clarification if we should have done those reports if we had nothing those years. If we are wrong, then we will correct the issue with the state and submit them as required. We strive to be transparent."
The department did not have a report for 2022 because they lost many of their documents in a fire last fall.
We did not receive a response from Rossville or Trenton police departments.
Depend on us to keep you posted.