Alaska Pilot’s $95,000 Cessna on the Line for Passenger’s Beer

Aviator asks U.S. Supreme Court to decide if forfeiting his airplane is an excessive fine.

Ryan Ewing

Tuesday, September 02, 2025 at 11:30 AM ET

Verified

Edited By:

Travis Tingle

A Cessna 206 floatplane takes off at Priest Lake, Idaho, with Chimney Rock and the Selkirk Mountains in the background. [Shutterstock/FlyIdaho]

Key Takeaways:

Alaska bush pilot Ken Jouppi is facing permanent forfeiture of his $95,000 airplane after his passenger was discovered carrying beer into a dry village, despite Jouppi's conviction being a misdemeanor with a minimal fine.
State courts upheld Alaska's law mandating aircraft forfeiture for transporting any alcohol into dry communities, even for minor offenses.
Jouppi is now petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that taking his plane for such a minor violation constitutes an excessive fine under the Eighth Amendment, seeking to clarify proportionality in asset forfeiture cases and limit government overreach.

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For more than a decade, longtime Alaska bush pilot Ken Jouppi has been locked in a legal battle with the state of Alaska over his 1969 Cessna U206D. At issue: whether the state can permanently take his $95,000 airplane after troopers discovered his passenger carrying beer into a dry village.

On April 3, 2012, Jouppi was preparing to fly a passenger from Fairbanks to Beaver, an Alaska community that voted to ban alcohol in 2004. Hidden in her luggage were three cases of Budweiser and Bud Light. State troopers intercepted the flight before takeoff, charging Jouppi with knowingly transporting alcohol into a dry village. He was convicted of a misdemeanor and fined $1,500—the statutory minimum—while serving three days in jail.