A North Carolina teenager was hoping to get her life back on track after a state judge ordered a man who sexually abused her to pay her $69,000. Instead, she got a nasty surprise.
The local police department had already seized the cash through civil asset forfeiture, and it was already gone. Despite a judge’s order, she will get nothing.
The case is a stunning example of the misplaced priorities and perverse incentives that asset forfeiture creates for police—and of how the federal government allows state and local police to evade reforms to stop forfeiture abuse.
As originally reported by local news outlet WCNC Charlotte, the Mint Hill Police Department (MHPD) investigated Mario Alberto Gomez-Saldana II for sexual abuse in 2019. Saldana pleaded guilty to multiple sex crimes years later in 2023 and is currently serving a prison sentence. The now-17-year-old teenage victim’s family filed a civil suit against Gomez-Saldana shortly after and secured a consent order for $69,130 to be turned over to her.
WCNC reports:
Records show when MHPD investigated the sex abuse case in July 2019, they found suspected marijuana, drug paraphernalia and cash inside the suspect’s home. The victim’s family and their attorney said, at the time, an officer assured them the money would be available to one day pursue in a civil suit and in the years after, continued telling them the money remained held in property….
Unbeknownst to them, investigators seized the cash and partnered with a federal agency to apply for asset forfeiture, citing probable cause of illicit drug activity. MHPD investigators never charged the suspect with any drug crimes, only sex offenses, but that didn’t prevent the department from eventually collecting more than $45,000 of the seized money in 2020 through what’s called the Equitable Sharing Program, according to records. The federal government received the rest of the money.
“I’ve been dealing with this since I was 5 years old and I’m almost 18 and I just want to move on to the next chapter of my life,” the teenager, who is unnamed in the story, told WCNC Charlotte. “That money was going to help me do it and without it, it just feels like three steps back. It’s honestly so frustrating and difficult.”
Under civil asset forfeiture laws, police can seize property suspected of being connected to illegal activity even if the owner isn’t charged with a crime. MHPD could use the drugs in Saldana’s house as a premise to take his money, even though, as WCNC reports, a simple Google search shows Saldana won the lottery in 2018, collecting $70,507 in winnings after taxes.
Hellbound and Down 