G+M "Timeline: How B.C. has seized $41-million in property in nearly eight years" 25 Jan 2014 This Act makes it possible for the government to amerce or to seize property without due process, and the Civil Forfeiture Office (CFO) has been eager to use this power in order to fill the coffers of government.G+M: "B.C. Opposition plans to question scope of ‘cash cow’ office that seizes property" 28 Jan 2014G+M: "WHEN THE PROVINCE GOES AFTER ILL-GOTTEN GAINS, WHO PAYS?" 25 Jan 2014 The office does not need criminal charges, or convictions, to amerce a property.
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Few men did. For example, Richard de Plescys, Prior of Dunmow Priory, was intimidated into storing and looking after a cart and horses of FitzWalter's, at the prior's own expense. The prior did not report FitzWalter, despite the fact that his house, at least in theory, enjoyed the king's personal protection. FitzWalter later despatched his henchman Baltrip to forcibly and illegally amerce and distrain the prior.
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An amercement is a financial penalty in English law, common during the Middle Ages, imposed either by the court or by peers. The noun "amercement" lately derives from the verb to amerce, thus: the King amerces his subject, who offended some law. The term is of Anglo-Norman origin (Law French, from French, from Latin), and literally means "being at the mercy of": a-merce-ment (English mercy is cognate). While it is often synonymous with a fine, it differs in that a fine is a fixed sum prescribed by statute and was often voluntary, while an amercement is arbitrary.
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In 2007, Michael Bryant, then Attorney-General for Ontario, was "proud that Ontario continues to be a nationally and internationally recognized leader in the field of civil forfeiture." The Ontario Civil Remedies for Illicit Activities (CRIA) office was, according to Bryant, "considered an international authority on civil forfeiture," as the Civil Remedies Act had been the first of its kind in Canada.Text of A-G Ont report "Civil forfeiture in Ontario 2007: An update on the Civil Remedies Act, 2001" In Ontario, the legislation has been used to amerce large quantities of banknotes. A law officer detained a citizen for driving too slowly.
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One record from the year 1270 states that Philip, Lord of Shelvock, was also lord of Shotatton. Shotatton, Shelvock, and Eardiston were most likely the three Berewicks of the Domesday Manor of Wykey. Philip must have derived his title to the property from William Fitz Walter to account for the Lord of Shelvock having the right to hold a Court and to amerce (punish by fine) the township of Shotatton. About 1301 the Le Strange family sold Ruyton, with all its homages and fees, to their suzerain Edmund Fitz Alan, Earl of Arundel, which would include all their rights over Wykey and Shelvock; however about 1325 John, Lord of Shelvock gives to the Abbot of Haghmond a quit claim as to certain lands at Balderton. Apparently, Shelvock had not passed with Ruyton into the immediate possession of the Earl of Arundel, but was still held by an under-tenant, presumably a descendant of the William Fitz Walter to whom it had been granted in 1175.
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