Detroit police can no longer seize cars through civil asset forfeiture unless they can show that the car was used for trafficking drugs, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled Monday.
The court held that Detroit resident Stephanie Wilson's 2006 Saturn Ion was not subject to the state's forfeiture laws because there was no evidence when police seized it in 2019—most notably no drugs—indicating she was using it to move and sell narcotics. It is not enough to merely claim that a car was near a suspected drug crime or that a passenger possessed drugs for personal use.
