Dear John,

I have a breaking news update to share with you. Today, we secured a resounding win for the Fourth Amendment and against civil forfeiture. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit unanimously ruled ([link removed] ) that the FBI’s raid of over 700 security deposit boxes at US Private Vaults was unconstitutional.

Paul and Jennifer Snitko never had any trouble with the law. They are upstanding citizens who simply wanted a private space to store their most prized possessions—such as Paul’s flight log and his father’s watches—which led them to US Private Vaults in southern California.

Then, in March 2021, the Snitkos and hundreds of others found themselves in a waking nightmare. The FBI executed a raid of US Private Vaults, broke into every security deposit box, seized their contents, and then initiated civil forfeiture proceedings against the property without telling box holders what they were accused of doing wrong.

Moreover, to obtain a warrant to seize the property of US Private Vaults, the FBI misled a federal magistrate judge and concealed critical details about its plan for the individually rented security deposit boxes. The FBI claimed they were only interested in the company’s property, but secretly FBI agents had already decided they would use civil forfeiture to take every asset in every customer’s box that was worth over $5,000.

But, as you know, IJ believes that the government can’t steal your property and force you to prove your innocence.

So, the Snitkos teamed up with us and several other victims to file a federal class action lawsuit to hold the government accountable and affirm that the FBI never should have opened any of the security deposit boxes in the first place.

And today, in a fiery opinion, the 9th Circuit unanimously agreed, invoking a powerful comparison between the FBI’s raid and the “writs of assistance” that British authorities used to conduct limitless searches in colonial America, saying, “It was those very abuses of power, after all, that led to the adoption of the Fourth Amendment in the first place.”

The court also ordered the FBI to destroy the records created during the searches of the security boxes, such as video of people’s private documents, that it had no right to possess.

We have two other active cases involving the FBI's raid of US Private Vaults: another nationwide class action lawsuit challenging the FBI’s insufficient forfeiture notices, and a case to hold the government accountable for seizing, and then losing, our client’s property.

Thank you for standing with IJ as we unravel the FBI’s forfeiture scheme and reinforce the constitutional protections afforded to all Americans.

Scott

Scott G. Bullock

President and Chief Counsel

Institute for Justice

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