[zanny]

Innocent until proven guilty must apply. And it is preposterous to tell a presumed innocent they cannot use their money to defend themselves in court.

If they spend that money and then lose, they are still responsible for the reimbursement. If its not money they will ever make in their lifetime, you can just garnish their income forever. It is magnitudes less injust for those whose money was stolen to never get the full amount back (as long as the responsible is compelled to give all their excess in compensation) than possibly finding the innocent guilty because they could not defend themselves.

But this is symptomatic of the fundamental issue in criminal justice that you need significant wealth to defend yourself. That in and of itself is the greatest injustice here, but making it harder on citizens to defend themselves cannot be the answer.