Trucker gets to keep fighting to get his seized $39,500 back

May 13, 2022

Chuck Robinson

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Jerry Johnson, owner of Triple J. Logistics
Jerry Johnson, owner of Triple J. Logistics, gets a win in court that lets him keep fighting to get his $39,500 back after it was seized 19 months ago. No charges were filed in the case, but prosecutors thought it smelled like marijuana. (Photo courtesy Institute for Justice)

 

The owner of a small trucking business whose cash was seized when he flew to Phoenix for a truck auction has won a court battle allowing him to continue to fight for his money.

Jerry Johnson’s $39,500 in cash was seized Aug. 17, 2020, at Phoenix’s Sky Harbor Airport. It was in two cardboard boxes– $7,500 in his carry-on backpack and $32,000 in boxes he had packed in his checked luggage. He was never charged with any crime, but Maricopa County prosecutors and law enforcement officers seized the money through civil asset forfeiture. They said they suspected that it was drug money being laundered.

Johnson owns Triple J. Logistics, which is licensed in Maryland. He works from the Charlotte, N.C., area hauling dry van freight. He said he was planning to add to his fleet of two Peterbilts with one of several available through Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers in Phoenix.

Required to sign a form

Law enforcement officers interrogated Johnson for an hour at the airport, Johnson told Land Line in July 2021. They told him they thought his money smelled like marijuana. Law enforcement officers knew he had been charged with marijuana and cocaine possession in 2005 and 2012.

When they offered to let him go, they made him sign a paper that was a “disclaimer of ownership” form, Johnson said. It said he was surrendering his money.

“He told me if I didn’t sign that paper he’s going to arrest me,” Johnson told Land Line in July 2021.

He left Phoenix without staying the night or going to the auction. Even though he was never charged with a crime, an Arizona trial court ruled that Jerry failed to prove the cash was his and, therefore, he could not contest the civil forfeiture of his money. Johnson reached out to the nonprofit public interest law firm Institute for Justice to contest the trial court’s ruling.

The decision comes six months after Jerry Johnson’s attorneys and a representative from the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office gave oral arguments before the appeals court as to whether the Maricopa County Superior Court’s finding that Johnson failed to prove the money was his was correct.

In its May 10 decision, the Court of Appeals concluded that, “This was a not a trivial or technical error,” and that the lower court’s ruling violated Jerry’s right to due process, according to news release from the Institute for Justice. The decision further affirms that “Johnson in fact proved he owned the money.”

Judges critical during oral arguments

Judges were critical of the Maricopa County attorney’s comments about the ownership of the seized money during the Nov. 9, 2021, oral arguments before the Arizona Court of Appeals.

“I don’t know how much I have in my wallet,” Judge Peter Swann told the prosecutor in November. “Do you need to check it? Should I be worried that the police are going to come check it? Am I going to have to explain where I got it?”

Swann wrote the court’s May 10 decision.

“The state argues that Johnson failed to prove ownership, but if it is not Johnson’s money, then whose money is it?” Swann wrote in the decision. “The state failed to introduce any evidence of who owned the money.”

The government has 30 days to appeal the Court of Appeals’ ruling to the Arizona Supreme Court. If it does not appeal, the case will be sent back to the trial court, where the government will either have to prove that Jerry’s money was connected to criminal activity or return it.

“Today’s decision points out the obvious: Jerry Johnson properly proved ownership of his money and has the right to defend it in court,” Alexa Gervasi, one of the attorneys representing Johnson, said in a written statement. “The scales are already tipped in the government’s favor in civil forfeiture, but the lower court went outside the bounds of Arizona law when it forced Jerry to prove his own innocence. We are glad that Jerry will have his day in court to defend against the unjust forfeiture of his life savings.”

Arizona civil asset forfeiture reform

Since Johnson’s money was seized, On May 5, 2021, such waivers later became illegal after Gov. Doug Ducey signed a bill that reformed Arizona’s civil forfeiture laws. Civil asset forfeiture now requires a criminal conviction for the state to forfeit one’s property in civil court under most circumstances. LL