Article on the Culley v Marshall case that recently got announced by SCOTUS. The Gorsuch concurrence hints that a 5-4 majority of the court might want to reel in the practice of civil asset forfeiture.
Direct link to the concurrence [here]
But in future cases, with the benefit of full briefing, I hope we might begin the task of assessing how well the profound changes in civil forfeiture practices we have witnessed in recent decades comport with the Constitution’s enduring guarantee that “[n]o person shall . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
I can see Thomas feeling this way. From an originalist POV it could be viewed as expansion of a minor exception to limit the original meaning of the Bill of Rights beyond what it originally meant. He’d probably still support it in the original context of smugglers abandoning ships full of untaxed cargo.