Police seize $645 million worth of assets in 10 years

Police say seizure of millions of dollars in assets over past decade drives home message that crime doesn't pay. Photo / Supplied

Crime doesn't pay - at least not for the owners of hundreds of millions of dollars of assets forfeited to police over the past 10 years.

More than $645 million worth of real estate,cash and other property has been targeted by police in the decade since asset seizure laws were introduced.

Police have eyed everything from luxury homes, jewellery and Rolls Royces to boats, artwork and gold bars under the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act, and say doing so is taking the profit out of crime.

But one couple whose $6.8m lifestyle block was sold off labelled the law "absolutely abhorrent" and say they've been treated unfairly.

The law allows police to restrain people's assets if they suspect the property was acquired using the proceeds of crime.

If police apply to the High Court for a forfeiture order, the owner must prove to a judge they acquired the assets legitimately, otherwise they will be sold off.

Police have steadily been putting more specialist resources into this area in the past 10 years, but they are "not about making money", said the acting national manager of the financial crime group, Detective Inspector Craig Hamilton.

"Our success should be measured on more than just the value of confiscations. It's about deterring people from getting involved in crime and preventing the expansion of criminal business and enterprise."

Detective Inspector Craig Hamilton says police aren't about making money, but taking it out of the hands of criminals. Photo / Alan Gibson

Nearly half of what's been seized since 2009 is still frozen.

"Most of it gets forfeited," Hamilton said. "Only on very rare occasions have our forfeiture proceedings not been successful."

If another innocent party has an interest in property, that will also be considered.

"We might seek to forfeit a bad guy's interest in a property, but not forfeit the bank's interest in a property," Hamilton said.

"We're trying to make crime unprofitable."

The Official Assignee - the office in charge - must make sure the property doesn't devalue while police are investigating.

When it's forfeited, it will be sold through auctions and tenders.

"There's a process around returning those funds to the community," Hamilton said.

"The funds are used, I guess, to combat the problem, particularly drugs."

Drug Foundation executive director Ross Bell said the organisation often benefited from money gained through the seizure of assets, but cautioned against seeing seizure as the solution to New Zealand's drug problems.

Illustration / Rod Emmerson

"We have to be careful we don't get too attracted to the big piles of cash," he said.

"If this is a way of undermining the power of organised crime, then that is certainly a good thing, but knowing the scale of the drug market, is asset seizure really the thing that's going to break the back of organised crime?"

Human rights lawyer Michael Bott said the practice could affect innocent people.

For example, a spouse might not have realised what their partner was doing, and can lose control of a shared asset.

"The innocent party can find themselves down a rabbit hole and the results can be devastating," he said.

There was also a chance people who gained assets legitimately a long time ago and no longer had records or memories of how they gained them could end up in a tight spot.

"I think more often than not police obviously have reasonable grounds for a suspicion," Bott said.

Rob and Llannys Burgess are one couple that say they've been unfairly affected by the law, which Rob called "absolutely abhorrent".

Second-hand dealer Rob Burgess at his family home in Taupaki, West Auckland, before it was seized and forfeited to the Crown. Photo / File

The second-hand dealer pleaded guilty to receiving $250,000 of stolen gold and jewellery and was sent to prison in 2014.

His four-hectare lifestyle block near Auckland was forfeited and sold for $6.8m in 2017.

"I lost everything I had ever earned," said Rob, who says he never committed any crime and called the law "f***ing evil".

"My health just deteriorated, from being a wealthy man to nothing in five months flat."

He said he was now on an invalid's benefit and was waiting for a heart transplant.

Hamilton said the victims of theft might feel differently about what the Burgesses were experiencing.

"Having been caught involved in a crime . . . what they're really saying is it's really unfair that we had to explain where our money came from."

What are the numbers?

• At least $645m restrained since 2009

• At least $228m forfeited to the Crown

• $304m remains frozen, pending forfeiture

• The largest forfeiture was $42.85m in the case of one of New Zealand's most controversial citizens, William Yan.

• $68.03m restrained last year, with $32.41m of that in the form of residential property

• $31.45m restrained last year in cases relating to organised crime and gangs

What have police seized?

William Yan, also known as Bill Liu, Yang Liu and Yong Ming Yan, reached a $42.85m settlement with police after he was accused of complex fraud in China.

His frozen assets included a collection of luxury cars, the Metropolis apartment - five titles joined together on the 35th floor - an 18.8 per cent stake in Mega, millions in bank accounts, a troubled North Shore property development and a Waikato farm.

Earlier this year, police seized $3.7m in assets in raids on Comanchero gang properties in Auckland, on the suspicion the gang was importing drugs and laundering millions of dollars.

The haul includes several luxury vehicles, including a number of Range Rovers, a Rolls-Royce Wraith and two Harley Davidson motorcycles.

The Masala group, which ran an Auckland restaurant chain, forfeited $8m in assets in 2017 when police investigated it for "widespread and systemic tax evasion and immigration-related offending".

The properties were restrained in New Zealand's biggest-ever asset seizure at the time ($34m), which also included safe deposit boxes.