Forfeiture at work: Rochelle Bing has struggled for 4 years to prevent thugs from seizing her house on the grounds that her son sold drugs there.

The supposed reason for this is to terrorize the head of every family exercise an impossible level of strict control over the rest. Perhaps a middle-class housewife can watch everything that people do in her house, though teenagers will tend to resist that. However, no working person could possibly do this.

That is purely theoretical. The real reason is that the thug department wants money, and will take it on any available pretext from anyone who is vulnerable.

Seizing property is a punishment, and calling it something else is merely a legal lie. Under the US constitution, a punishment should only follow due process of law: conviction of a crime.

As for the thugs and the money they thirst for, if we legalize regulated sale of drugs, we could get along with a lot fewer thugs. Not only the victimless drug crimes, but the robberies fueled by drug habits, would disappear.

The article tangentially touches on another grave danger: it is a bad thing for anyone to have 18 grandchildren. We need to prevent that from happening in the future, but seizing houses from grandparents is not going to help.