Supreme Court to hear Alaska pilot plane seizure case

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed on Monday, July 20, 2026, to hear the case of an Alaskan bush pilot who is challenging the state's attempt to seize his airplane after a passenger brought a six-pack of beer on a flight to a remote "dry" village.

The pilot, 82-year-old Kenneth Jouppi, was convicted of a misdemeanor for the April 3, 2012, incident. State troopers discovered the beer in a passenger's luggage before his scheduled flight from Fairbanks to the village of Beaver, which has banned the sale and possession of alcohol for decades. Jouppi was fined $1,500 and sentenced to three days in jail. Under Alaska law, any vehicle used to illegally import alcohol into such a community is subject to mandatory forfeiture, leading the state to pursue the seizure of Jouppi's 1969 Cessna, valued at approximately $95,000.

Jouppi, a veteran who operated a one-man air taxi service, has argued for over a decade that he was unaware the alcohol was in his passenger's luggage. His appeal to the Supreme Court centers on the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on excessive fines. He contends that forfeiting an airplane worth tens of thousands of dollars for a single six-pack of beer is a grossly...