In October 2024, an officer with the Mt. Sterling Police Department pulled over a woman near a back alley on the east side of town. Inside her Jeep, he said he found two ounces of crystal meth and $933 in cash.
A few months later, in January, a Tompkinsville Police officer stopped a man for a minor traffic violation. He smelled marijuana, so he searched the vehicle and said he found a few grams, some cocaine, more than 900 fentanyl pills and $732 in cash.
Then in March, a Scottsville Police officer spotted a black SUV with an expired license plate. He also smelled weed inside the vehicle. He said he found nearly a pound, along with edibles, cocaine, pills, scales and $1,043 in cash.
Officers at each agency seized the cash, spread the bills on a table and snapped photos which they later shared on Facebook. But none reported the seizures to Kentucky’s Justice and Public Safety Cabinet, according to records obtained by the Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting.
The agencies are among more than 80 others across Kentucky that failed to report to state officials their yearly haul of cash seizures, a requirement under the state’s asset forfeiture law. A KyCIR review of state records show nearly 24% of Kentucky’s law enforcement agencies failed to comply with the law that mandates each agency detail how much money they take through the process known as asset forfeiture.
Kentucky’s asset forfeiture law gives police wide authority to take and keep anything of value if they suspect it’s tied to drug trafficking.
But each year, dozens of agencies fail to disclose how much cash, cars and guns they take from people across the state.
In 2018, KyCIR found just 11% of agencies consistently filed the required reports. After that report, the compliance rate climbed.
Without total transparency, it’s impossible to know just how much money police are taking from people. And, experts say, agencies that fail to report sidestep a system set up to provide oversight and accountability to a controversial practice that civil liberty advocates warn is rife with the potential for abuse.
Transparency in asset forfeiture allows the public to see the scope of cash seizures and if police are making sizable seizures indicative of drug dealers, or if they’re taking cash from everyday people, said David Warren, a senior research analyst at the Institute for Justice, a Virginia-based law firm that specializes in civil liberty cases.
“Reporting, accurate reporting, full reporting, gives us the ability to look at these sorts of statistics and see how this is working for citizens,” he said.
In Kentucky, law enforcement is not required to prove cash is tied to drug dealing in order to make a seizure. Warren said this bolsters the need for comprehensive reporting.
“That threat to property rights is a really important reason why we need to have a good handle of how forfeiture is working within the state,” he said.
The numbers
State data obtained by KyCIR through an open records request shows 205 agencies reported seizing more than $9.2 million between July 1, 2024 and June 30, 2025. The reported total is the most seized by police in Kentucky since the 2022 fiscal year, when agencies took more than $12.7 million.
In Kentucky, law enforcement keeps 85% of what they take. The rest goes to prosecutors. Supporters argue the practice disrupts drug dealing and helps fund law enforcement. Opponents say the potential for profit creates a perverse incentive that fuels abuse.
Several Kentucky law enforcement officials have faced criminal charges in recent years stemming from misuse of asset forfeiture funds.
Prosecutors can also use seized cash as leverage to coax people into plea deals, even when there’s little proof the cash is the fruits of drug dealing. KyCIR reviewed hundreds of court cases in 2018 involving seized cash and found one in four were closed without the defendant being convicted of drug dealing — yet still they lost their money.
Kentucky agencies that fail to report are subject to penalty. Under state law, the Attorney General must file a lawsuit to recover seized funds from agencies that fail to report — but last year a spokesperson for the state’s Justice and Public Safety Cabinet said that’s never happened. Morgan Hall, the spokesperson, did not respond to a request for comment for this report.
Law enforcement agencies are required to submit annual asset forfeiture reports to the state office no later than Sept. 15 each year.
KyCIR requested records in early November. A week later, cabinet officials provided two spreadsheets — one for police departments, another for sheriffs — listing 378 agencies across the state. The records show 90 agencies failed to submit an asset forfeiture report.
In the past, law enforcement advocates chalked up the lack of reporting to confusion and suggested the burden should instead be put upon the courts, since judges are the ones who give final say on asset forfeitures.
Shawn Butler, the executive director of the Kentucky Association of Chiefs of Police, told KyCIR last year that many agencies that don’t seize cash are likely confused about the reporting requirements.
The Justice Cabinet website that provides reporting instructions for law enforcement agencies states, in bold lettering, that agencies should report if they did — or did not — make any seizures in the preceding year.
Butler did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this article.
Scottsville Police Chief Daniel Wilson disputed the state’s records. He said the agency did submit annual asset forfeiture totals, but the details aren’t included in records maintained by the Justice Cabinet. Mt. Sterling Police Chief Aaron Noel took over in September and said the failure to report “was most likely looked over” during the leadership transition. He said the agency is “working to correct.” Officials in Tompkinsville did not respond to a request for comment.
Top takers
The Jefferson County Sheriff topped the list in fiscal year 2025, reporting nearly $2.1 million in seized cash, according to the state data. The agency has carved out an asset forfeiture honey hole by taking millions in cash from UPS packages through the years.
Louisville Metro Police reported taking more than $1.9 million — more than double its haul the previous two years but not quite back to the level it reached from 2019 to 2022 when the agency averaged $3.9 million in seized cash annually.
The Kentucky State Police reported seizing more than $868,000. The Lexington Police Department reported more than $484,000. The Nicholasville Police Department reported more than $423,000 — the most the agency has reported seizing since at least 2019.
The other 168 agencies that reported taking cash last year seized an average of $20,000 each — ranging from Bardstown Police Department’s $303,000 to Pineville Police Department’s $6.
Agencies use seized cash to buy equipment, pay utility bills and fuel a network of confidential informants, KyCIR found in a 2019 report.
