Welcome to Spodek Law Group. Our goal is to give you the reality of cash seizures at LaGuardia Airport - not the sanitized version law enforcement presents, not the "just cooperate and it will be fine" fiction, but the actual truth about what happens when federal agents take your money and how the system is designed to keep it.
Heres what nobody tells you upfront: when cash is seized at an airport, the government doesnt need to prove YOU did anything wrong. They charge your money with a crime. Literally. The case name becomes something like "United States v. $47,000 in U.S. Currency." Your money becomes the defendant. And unlike you, your money has no constitutional rights.
This changes everything about how you need to respond. Because while youre thinking "Ill explain where the money came from and get it back," the government is counting on you to miss a 35-day deadline that forfeits your cash automatically - no hearing, no judge, no chance to explain anything.
The Money Is The Defendant (Not You)
In criminal law, your innocent until proven guilty. Everyone knows this. But civil asset forfeiture flips this completely. Its called "in rem" prosecution - Latin for "against a thing." The government literally sues your property, not you.
This isnt some technicality. It fundementally changes the burden of proof. In criminal court, prosecutors must prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. In civil forfeiture? YOU must prove your money is "innocent" by a preponderance of evidence. You must prove a negative. You must document every dollar's source while the government sits back and waits for you to fail.
The Institute for Justice analyzed federal forfeiture data and found something disturbing. Between 2000 and 2016, Homeland Security seized over $2 billion from airport travelers through 30,574 seizures. In 85% of NYPD forfeiture cases, the property owner was never charged with any crime. Think about that. 85% never charged - they just lost there money anyway.
Heres the kicker: 91% of these seizures are processed under civil forfeiture procedures, with only 7% ever reaching a courtroom. The other 93% of cases? Government attorneys - not judges - decide wheather the seizure was justified. Theyre judge and jury in their own case.
How TSA Becomes The DEAs Eyes
You probably beleive TSA is about airport security. Weapons. Explosives. Keeping flights safe. And technicaly, thats true - TSA itself cannot seize your cash. Theres no law limiting how much money you can carry on a domestic flight.
But heres were it gets interesting. When your carry-on goes through the X-ray and a TSA officer spots bundled currency, they dont just let it go. They radio ahead. They tip off DEA agents waiting past security. You walk through the checkpoint thinking everythings fine. Then a federal agent approaches you at the gate.
The DEA had a program called the Transportation Interdiction Program. Between 2022 and 2024, DEA agents seized over $22 million from airline passengers - but arrested only 57 people. Let that sink in. $22 million seized, 57 arrests. Thats a ratio that tells you this isnt about catching criminals. Its about taking money.
The DOJ Inspector General investigated and found DEA wasnt even following its own policies for "consensual encounters." The program created "significant legal risks." By January 2025, DEA suspended the program. But DHS and Customs Border Protection just picked up were DEA left off. The money-taking continues - different badge, same playbook.
OK so you might be wondering: what exactly happens in these encounters? The agent approaches and says something like "mind if I ask you a few questions?" Seems casual. You have nothing to hide, so you agree. This is "consent."
Then: "Mind if I look in your bag?" You consent again - becuase refusing seems like admitting guilt.
They find cash. Now the questions get pointed. "Why so much cash?" "Where did it come from?" "Where are you going with it?" Every answer sounds suspicious when your carrying twenty thousand dollars. Buying a car sounds like a cover story. Business deal sounds vague. Family emergency sounds convienient.
Heres the part that matters: anything you say can be used to justify seizure, and silence looks like admission of guilt. Theres no right answer. The encounter is designed to create probable cause out of your nervousness.
The 35-Day Time Bomb
After they take your money, you recieve a receipt. Maybe a DEA form. It has tiny print explaining "your rights." You fly home thinking youll sort this out. Maybe you call a lawyer Monday. Maybe you wait for the official letter.
This is were most people loose everything.
Under federal law (18 USC 983), the government has 60 days to send you a Notice of Seizure. But your deadline to respond isnt 60 days from getting the letter. Its 35 days from the date on the seizure notice. If the letter takes two weeks to reach you, if you dont check your mail, if you think you have time to "figure this out" - the clock is already running.
Miss the deadline? Your money is forfeit by DEFAULT. Not by decision. Not after a hearing. By your own failure to file a "verified claim" within 35 days. And heres the thing nobody mentions: 95% of seized cash is forfeited to the government because people dont hire lawyers and fight back.
Thats not an accident. The system is designed to defeat people who dont know the rules. And the rules are stacked against you.
Todd Spodek has seen this pattern in hundreds of cases. The clients who come to us after missing deadlines - theres often nothing we can do. The clients who call within the first week? Completly different outcome. Time is the governments biggest weapon against you, and they count on you wasting it.
The Economics That Guarantee You Lose
Lets say agents seized $15,000 from you at LaGuardia. Thats your emergency fund, your small business operating cash, money you were bringing to a family member. Completley legitimate. You want to fight.
You call lawyers. They quote $5,000 to $10,000 to handle the case. Maybe more if it goes to trial. Suddenly the math doesnt work. Fighting for $15,000 costs $10,000 in legal fees? Even if you win, you lose.
This is intentional.
The seizure amounts are calibrated. Take enough to matter to you, but not enough where fighting makes economic sense. The government knows most people will calculate that walking away costs less then fighting back. They know 80% of people without lawyers never recover their money. They know offering a "settlement" - keep 30% of your money if you drop the case - sounds reasonable when the alternative is years of litigation.
At Spodek Law Group, weve handled cases were the AUSA offered to return 40% of seized funds as a "settlement." The client was supposed to feel grateful. For getting less then half of their own money back. Money they committed no crime with. Money the government could never prove was illegal.
This is how civil forfeiture actualy works. Not as a crime-fighting tool, but as a revenue stream. The Institute for Justice found that DEA deposited aproximately $3.8 billion into the Department's Asset Forfeiture Fund while returning only $153 million. Those funds go directly into agency budgets - equipment, overtime, operations. The agents taking your money are literaly funding their own departments.
What Actually Gets Your Money Back
So the system is rigged against you. Does anyone ever win?
Yes. But almost exclusivly people with lawyers who know the specific pressure points.
Consider Keddins Etienne. He was a filmmaker traveling through a New York airport in 2020 when DEA agents seized nearly $70,000 from him. He knew traveling with cash was legal. Didnt matter. They took it anyway, on the theory that large cash amounts "must somehow be connected to criminal activity."
But Etienne hired an attorney. Fought back. Eight months later, he got every dollar returned. Then he got an additional $15,000 settlement after his lawyer filed a federal lawsuit arguing DEA violated his Fourth Amendment rights.
The DEA paid him an extra $15,000. Because they knew they were wrong. Because when someone actualy fights back with legal representation, the government's case often falls apart.
In October 2020, DEA seized over $78,000 from a traveler at JFK. The lawyer showed problems with the legality of the initial detention. The Assistant US Attorney had 90 days after receiving the claim to file a complaint in federal court. They missed the deadline. Client got full refund.
Same month, same airport: $36,000 seized. Same pattern - lawyer challenged legality, AUSA missed 90-day deadline, full refund.
See the pattern? The government counts on you not knowing the deadlines. But those deadlines cut both ways. If you file your claim properly, the AUSA has 90 days to file a complaint - or they must return your money immediately. We use their own rules against them.
Studies show people without lawyers recover money in about 20% of cases. With specialized forfeiture attorneys? Recovery rates jump above 70%. The difference isnt the merits of your case. Its knowing how to fight.
The First 48 Hours After Seizure
If your reading this because agents just seized your cash at LaGuardia, heres what you need to do right now:
Hour 1-2: Document everything. Get a receipt or seizure form before leaving the airport. Note the agent's name, badge number, agency. Write down every question they asked and every answer you gave while its fresh. The exact words matter for challenging the legality of the encounter later.
Hour 3-24: Preserve evidence. Ask your lawyer (when you hire one) to send a preservation letter to the agency. Security camera footage, body camera footage, communication logs - all of this can dissapear if not preserved immediately.
Day 1-3: Gather your documentation. Bank statements showing the source of funds. Business records if its business cash. Gift letters if it was a gift. Receipts for recent sales. The government will demand you prove where the money came from - start building that file now.
Day 3-7: Hire a forfeiture lawyer. Not a general criminal defense attorney. Someone who specificaly handles asset seizure cases. The procedures are arcane, the deadlines are strict, and a missed filing can cost you everything.
Day 7-35: File your verified claim. This is not optional. This is not "one option among many." This is the ONLY way to force the government into court where a judge - not a prosecutor - decides if the seizure was legal. Without this claim filed within 35 days, you forfeit by default.
At Spodek Law Group, we've seen what happens when people try to handle this themselves. They write letters explaining where the money came from. They call the phone number on the receipt. They wait for someone to "see reason." Meanwhile the 35 days tick away.
The government is not going to "see reason." They have your money. They want to keep it. The only language they understand is a verified claim followed by agressive legal representation.
The Mistakes That Guarantee You Lose Your Money
Weve seen every mistake possible in these cases. Some are recoverable. Some are fatal. Heres the pattern of what destroys peoples chances before they even start.
Mistake #1: Talking too much at the airport. The agent seems friendly. Casual. Like hes just trying to understand. But every word you say becomes part of the seizure justification. "I was going to buy a car" becomes "suspect had vague explanation for currency." "Its from my business" becomes "suspect claimed business income but could not provide documentation." Theres no answer that doesnt sound suspicious when your holding twenty thousand dollars. The less you say, the better. You can politely decline to answer questions beyond identifying yourself.
Mistake #2: Signing the "consent to search" form. They hand you a form. It looks official. They say its just paperwork. But your signing away your Fourth Amendment rights. Without that signature, they need probable cause to search your bags beyond the security screening. With it? You "consented." The search becomes legal. The seizure becomes defensable. Every defense strategy just got harder.
Mistake #3: Leaving without documentation. In the chaos of having your money taken, you just want to get on your flight. Get home. Figure it out later. But if you leave without a seizure receipt, without the agent's name and badge number, without documenting exactly what was said - your making the governments job easier and your lawyers job impossable.
Mistake #4: Waiting for the official letter. The Notice of Seizure will come eventually. Maybe in two weeks. Maybe in six. But your 35-day deadline started at seizure, not delivery. Every day you wait for that letter is a day closer to automatic forfeiture. Dont wait for the letter. Start fighting now.
Mistake #5: Filing a petition instead of a claim. This is were people who try to represent themselves get destroyed. A "petition for remission" goes to the agency. The agency decides. No court involved. No judge. And theres no deadline for them to respond - some people wait six months just to get denied.
A "verified claim" forces the case into federal court. The government then has 90 days to file a complaint or return your money. This is the path with leverage. But most people dont know the difference, file the wrong thing, and lose everything.
What Nobody Tells You About Your Rights
Heres something that will make you angry: there was no legal limit on how much cash you could carry. None. Zero. Carrying $50,000 on a domestic flight is completly legal. But the moment you do, law enforcement treats it as evidence of crime.
The reporting requirement for international travel - disclosing $10,000 or more on a FinCEN 105 form - only applies when leaving or entering the country. Domestic flights? No disclosure required. No paperwork required. Yet 50% of DHS airport seizures hapened because of "paperwork issues" - mostly people failing to report on international flights.
The Fourth Amendment is supposed to protect you against unreasonable searches and seizures. TSA's authority is limited to "administrative searches" for flight safety - weapons, explosives. They cant extend those searches into general law enforcement investigation without reasonable suspicion a crime occured.
But the Institute for Justice filed a federal class-action lawsuit claiming exactly this: TSA violates the Fourth Amendment by seizing bags with "large" currency amounts without probable cause. DEA violates Fourth Amendment by seizing cash without probable cause. The lawsuit is ongoing. Meanwhile, the seizures continue.
Look, the legal landscape is shifting. DEA suspended its airport seizure program. Courts are increasingly skeptical of forfeitures without criminal charges. But none of that helps you if your money was seized last week and your sitting on a 35-day clock.
The time to understand this system was before you traveled. The time to act is now.
Why LaGuardia Is Different
Not all airports are equal when it comes to seizures. LaGuardia, JFK, and Newark form the New York tri-state airport cluster that sees massive volumes of cash movement - and correspondingly agressive interdiction efforts.
The Eastern District of New York handles many of these forfeiture cases. The AUSAs in this district have established procedures, relationships with DEA and CBP, and a pipeline that processes seizures efficiently. They know the forms. They know the deadlines. They know exactly how to keep your money.
But this also means defense attorneys who work these cases regularly know the players. Know the tendencies. Know which arguments work and which waste time. Theres value in having counsel whos handled dozens of LaGuardia seizures rather then someone learning the Eastern District procedures for the first time on your case.
LaGuardia specifcaly sees domestic travel primarily - shuttles to DC, business travelers to Chicago, family visits across the country. These arent international drug trafficking routes. These are Americans traveling within their own country with their own money. Yet the seizures happen anyway.
The agents working LaGuardia know certain patterns. Cash going to certain destinations. Cash in certain amounts. Cash carried by people who "seem nervous" - which means everyone whose never been interrogated by federal agents before. Being nervous isnt a crime. But it becomes the justification for taking everything you have.
Weve represented clients whose money was seized at LaGuardia for reasons that would be comical if they werent devastating. A small business owner carrying weekly deposits because their bank was closed. A grandmother bringing cash for a grandchilds college expenses. A consultant paid in cash by a client. All had there money taken. All had to fight to get it back. All would have lost everything if they hadnt known to call a lawyer within the first week.
The Call That Costs Nothing
You have your money seized at LaGuardia. Your confused. Angry. Scared. You dont know if your under criminal investigation or if this is "just" civil forfeiture. You dont know if the $8,000 they took is worth fighting for.
Heres what we know after handling these cases for years: the government is counting on you to do nothing. To feel overwhelmed. To assume fighting is pointless. To miss the deadline that forfeits your money by default.
They've been preparing for months before approaching you. The DEA, DHS, CBP - they have procedures, forms, timelines. They know exactly what there doing. You have 35 days to catch up.
The clock started when they took your money. Not when you got the letter. Not when you felt ready to deal with it.
As Todd Spodek tells clients facing seizure: the first 48 hours determine whether you have options or not. Wait too long and those options disappear. Not because your case is weak - but because deadlines are weapons, and the government weilds them expertly.
They had years to build this system. You have days to fight back. Use them. Call 212-300-5196.
That call costs nothing. Not making it costs everything.
