Hacker News Reader

Comment by loupol | Hacker News Reader

> Sgt. David Fikes is still featured on the Brookhaven Police Department’s Facebook page even though he is conducting plain-clothes drug interdiction operations at the airport and elsewhere.

> Sgt. Fikes has been involved in the seizure of $1,163,047, according to records Atlanta News First Investigates obtained through an open records request. His department’s cut is about nine percent of that money, but Brookhaven is responsible for his salary, police car, K9 and other expenses.

So a cop's department gets a direct cut of the money they seize. Textbook example of a perverse incentive.

View on HN

Brookhaven is really shady.

They are an incorporated city JUST north of the Atlanta core that has rapidly annexed unincorporated parts of the area and they are THROWING money around like a rapper in Magic City.

There's a lot of community uproar lately about them pushing ahead with a SEVENTY-EIGHT MILLION DOLLAR city hall which apparently was not bid on and is quite a bit more than a very large mixed use complex that is being built down the street. Residents complaining their taxes have DOUBLED since being annexed, etc.

And yeah their police office is already much nicer and larger than even the City of Atlanta's

It was a lot shadier before Brookhaven incorporated. They are the reason the area exploded in many ways. I’m a former resident but I haven’t heard about the City Hall issue, guess they want to rival Sandy Springs. Looking online Sandy Spring’s City Hall cost $180 million.

This is not unusual. I can't put my hands on the article at the moment, but there are prosecutors offices and police departments funded entirely by civil forfeiture.

This is unusual outside of the states, because most people understand that this creates bad incentives.

You're absolutely right, it is routine in America. Civil forfeiture needs to go.

There was an article last year about a municipality effectively setting forfeiture targets because this money went into the general coffers and was integral to the municipal budget. It’s ridiculous.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com