Supreme Court to Hear $95,000 Alaska Plane Forfeiture Case Over 1 Six-Pack

1 articles · Updated · Fox News · Sep 26

December arguments will put the Supreme Court at the center of a fight over whether Alaska can seize Kenneth Jouppi’s $95,000 Cessna after his misdemeanor conviction for importing alcohol into a dry village.
The justices are being asked how to measure an excessive fine under the 8th Amendment: against the law’s $10,000 maximum penalty, as Alaska argues, or against Jouppi’s actual sentence of a $1,500 fine and three days in jail.
Jouppi, now 82, was running a one-man air taxi service in 2012 when troopers found a passenger’s six-pack of beer on board before a flight from Fairbanks to Beaver, where alcohol possession was banned.
The case could become a major test of civil asset forfeiture limits because the court has rarely defined the Excessive Fines Clause, leaving broader questions about proportionality and law-enforcement incentives unresolved.