[mikeortman]

Just be careful! In SOME jurisdictions, you can get in trouble for 'stealing' if you take back something that was stolen. Possession vs Ownership are 2 different things. For instance, the thief may have stolen something, sold it to someone who bought it in good-faith, and you take it back from that person, it's technically theft!

File a police report, go through the right channels. If you know its yours, call the police department non-emergency and explain the situation

[nostromo]

I’d be curious what jurisdiction that is true.

In my jurisdiction in the US it doesn’t matter if someone purchased the stolen goods or not, the goods still belong to the owner. This is sometimes called the "nemo dat" rule:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemo_dat_quod_non_habet

The person buying the stolen goods would need to file a claim against the thief to recover their money, but the goods still belong to the original owner. And this is how it should be, since it’s added reason not to buy goods you suspect are stolen.

And yes, you should always try and work with the police first and foremost.

[jorvi]

That is probably mostly a common law thing, and as the article notes

> however, in many cases, more than one innocent party is involved, making judgment difficult for courts and leading to numerous exceptions to the general rule that aim to give a degree of protection to bona fide purchasers and original owners

> The person buying the stolen goods would need to file a claim against the thief to recover their money

Generally as long as the purchase is made in good faith, you are wrong. It is the original owner that needs to file a claim against the thief.

Obviously, what constitutes a sale in "good faith" is a rather imprecise science, although one steady element is the sales price: it needs to have been appropriate for the item. So for example a mint bicycle or antique coin should sell near sticker price.

[graemep]

> in many cases, more than one innocent party is involved, making judgment difficult for courts and leading to numerous exceptions to the general rule that aim to give a degree of protection to bona fide purchasers and original owners

The next sentence is:

> The possession of the good of title will be with the original owner.

So you seem to be wrong there. The innocent buyer needs to file a claim against the thief, the original owner retails their title. It is explained in more detail later on.

[jorvi]

No, I know our legal system quite well. You are wrong.

The reason for this is so that if you buy a bicycle at, say, a bicycle fair and for a reasonable price, you shouldn’t have to worry about it being yoinked from under you later on.

Lawmakers have clarified this is choosing between two evils, there is no winning proposition here.

So, in conclusion: the original owner needs to file the claim, not the third party.

[hcurtiss]

To the degree lawmakers have weighed in, as you say, can you point me to a citation protecting the subsequent purchaser? I don't practice in this area, but that is definitely not my understanding of the law.

[liber8]

This guy is wrong, which is why he isn't citing any legal authority.

As anyone who has gone to law school will tell you, you can only acquire the title that the seller has. If seller stole the goods, he doesn't have any title, so he can't transfer title to a subsequent buyer. See, e.g. UCC § 2-403

There are exceptions when it comes to those who have voidable title (thieves do not have voidable title).

There are also cases where courts have more or less created exceptions close to those OP has described. For example, if Best Buy receives some stolen merchandise and sells it to good faith purchasers, courts have held that the victim needs to pursue the thief/Best Buy, not the end purchaser.

But generally, OP is wrong: if you buy a stolen bike at a flea market, you don't get title and the owner can get the bike back. Think of the policy implications if the rule was as OP claims. All thieves would have to do is immediately sell stolen goods and the owners could never get them back. That would be absurd.

[graemep]

"o, I know our legal system quite well. You are wrong"

"Our" legal system? Do you mean all common law countries or a particular one?

[codys]

The commenter appears to have been referring to a specific law in the netherlands without stating this.

[nsomaru]

The key element for a bona fide sale at common law is the buyer’s absence of knowledge of the defective title of the seller.

Not sure how US courts have interpreted this requirement but that’s the onus and I believe it rests on the third party buyer (to show absence of knowledge through evidence).

In that case the claim is against the thief only.

[ostacke]

Sweden is one such jurisdiction[1]. You can only retake what has been stolen from you if it is done shortly after the theft.

[1] https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sj%C3%A4lvt%C3%A4kt

[randallsquared]

...as appropriate for a culture of Viking raids, one would suppose!

[lazide]

Possession truly is 9/10ths of the law in this case I guess?

[easyThrowaway]

How would they even prove that if it's in the open? "Stolen? No idea, I've always had that bike, I just forgot where I left it last time. Went and got it back. By the way, here's the receipt."

[Xmd5a]

This happened to me. I bought a pair of headphones (Nuraphones) on ebay, only to have them bricked by the company remotely.

IIRC, they had a security hole on their payment page: they forgot to implement SCA (strong customer authentification, aka 2FA for payments). Had they done this, the liability would have shifted onto the bank/card issuer. For some reason they decided to go after the customers in vain resentment, were acquired and their product was discontinued.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Nuraphone/comments/8iw3he/beware_on...

[randunel]

Another jurisdiction example would be Romania. Even if the thief themselves are in possession of the property you own, you can be charged with theft if you steal it back. The law clearly delimits possession from ownership.

[chii]

> it's technically theft!

i hope that isn't true. A buyer of stolen goods needs to accept that a consequence of it is that they could lose possession of said good. This is why for expensive goods, you should ensure you're not buying stolen goods.

[mosselman]

Here in the Netherlands if you purchase something and cant reasonably know that it was stolen, then you become the legal owner.

It is logical that it works that way. Proving something is owned by someone else can be quite hard for certain items.

[neilv]

This is the most useful advice: call the police non-emergency number, explain concisely, and ask them what to do.

A bunch of the other suggestions, here on HN Streetwise ProTips, can get self and/or friends beaten, stabbed, and/or arrested.

[joshuahaglund]

IDK where you live but where I am, unless it's an actively life threatening emergency, the Police will say they're busy. I watched a drunk driver try to drive away after smashing into a parked car, ripping a wheel off the parked car. The drunk driver kept trying to start his car to get away. People called the police but they said they're busy. Fortunately his car was totaled and wouldn't start either. Over an hour later someone picked him up. If they can't even bother to deal with an active drunk driver, they aren't gonna help retrieve a bike.

Not saying confronting thieves is for everyone. But it's not necessarily as physical as you think.

[chmod775]

> IDK where you live but where I am, unless it's an actively life threatening emergency, the Police will say they're busy.

Where I live the basic law/constitution establishes a protection duty of its citizens by the state (this includes their property). The police is one of the ways the state takes care of this duty. If the state is grossly negligent in this or even does nothing at all, the state may very well be on the hook to make the injured party whole. This responsibility is passed down and carried by individual police officers, and there have been cases of police officers being personally convicted of causing bodily harm for not dispatching a unit after a request for aid (despite them not personally swinging any punches)[1].

Generally you'll have police show up for near anything if they can.

[1] https://www.wz.de/panorama/nach-notruf-keine-streife-geschic...

[wat10000]

In the US, it’s been established by the Supreme Court that the police have no duty to protect anyone. They can it they want to, and individual departments can make it a policy and fire officers who fail at it, but it’s not a fundamental requirement.

[true_religion]

I live in Arlington, VA where I once saw a purse snatcher being chased by 5 cops. Only to have 3 more show up after the guy was on the ground. They all had their own cars too.

During COVID, I called the non emergency line police for a break in on my car parked on the street and the police showed up in minutes then searched the area frantically to see if the guy was still around.

I don’t know if they are over funded or just bored.

[happyopossum]

Sounds like you live in a crappy big city like SF, Oakland, Santa Clara, etc.

For the vast majority of people who live in reasonable cities, calling the police for something like that will get a timely response.

[bagels]

Please tell us the magical place you live in that has friendly, helpful police with time to investigate every crime.

[Alupis]

Suburbs. We get 84 squad cars showing up for noise complaints...

Many larger cities don't have the budget to provide adequate police coverage. So you get this sort of "best effort" response.

This is made worse with recent years of "defund the police" policies creeping into some of our larger cities.

It just reinforces the Pro 2A community's saying - when seconds matter, help is just minutes away.

[bagels]

I live in "Suburbs" I have never seen 84 police cars respond to anything, even school shootings.

[weakfish]

Didn’t happen in the small North Carolina town that my parents live in, with a very similar situation as the parent. So truly, YMMV. Not all places can be generalized.

[saagarjha]

Santa Clara, population 110,000, is a big city to you?

[Thorrez]

Someone I know's phone was stolen. He tracked it using the track my phone feature to a house, and contacted the police asking the police to help get it back. The police said no, it's too dangerous, not worth it.

[TylerE]

No, THE most useful advice is not to take legal advice from cops.

[neilv]

How do you think the police will give bad advice, if you call them up and ask what to do?

[extra88]

There are countless examples of police not knowing the law.

If you talk to them in person, it should be to get an idea of what they'll do, which may or may not have something to do with what's legal.

If you want legal advice, ask a lawyer with experience in the relevant area.

[neilv]

You don't want legal advice. You know where your stolen bike is, so you call the police. I think that's the usual process.

Probably they will verify that the bike is yours, and retrieve it, or they will say that they don't have the resources.

Are people imagining that the police will say that you can go take the bike, but then turn around and arrest you for theft?

Of course, if the police tell you "finders keepers; it's in the Constitution", then you can seek legal advice.

[sneak]

No. The police will offer you the option to come to the police station and fill out a report so you can get a police report number for your insurance claim. Nothing else will happen.

Police don’t usually investigate petty crimes.

[michaelt]

> Are people imagining that the police will say that you can go take the bike, but then turn around and arrest you for theft?

People are imagining the police will tell you that you can't steal it back, when legally you can.

After all, it's the police's job to keep the peace. And things are more peaceful if I'm not busting up thieves' hideouts all guns blazing like Rambo.

[outworlder]

They aren't even required to know the law.

[chii]

> How do you think the police will give bad advice

the police will give you any advice, good or bad. They're not legally responsible for anything they said to you, as long as they're not telling you to commit a crime (in which case, if they did they will deny it).

You can still call 'em up of course - but don't 100% just trust their words blindly.

[toss1]

At this point in the US, it seems we are far better off asking ChatGPT or Claude than the average police station.

[ldoughty]

Ages ago when I tried calling the police...

"We cannot answer legal questions, please seek a lawyer for advise."

I don't do anything terribly interesting, so this was almost certainly not an issue actually worth paying $200 for a lawyer to answer.

[Kinrany]

Depends on how well they do their job, it's not hard to imagine them saying "file a report" and then ignoring it.

[vorpalhex]

It's probably a bad sign if you need permission from a desk clerk to get your property back.

It's great that you think _someone will handle that for you_ but it is probably a fantasy. Unfortunately you will probably need to self resolve. If you think it is going to escalate to violence, bring overwhelming force.

[darreninthenet]

This wouldn't be true in the UK, you can just take it back and use reasonable (which would be very light in the circumstances) force to do so.

[srockets]

The police won’t help you. It’s not their job.

[FabHK]

I was in Singapore in 2013 and there was a big sign on a street saying:

Crime Alert

THEFT OF BICYCLE

AT THIS NEIGHBOURHOOD

ON 20 MARCH 2013 @ 7 AM

Witnesses, please call Tanglin Police Division

(phone number redacted)

[happyopossum]

Move, or elect better local politicians. Your city is broken.

[serf]

we can't all live in Bedford Falls, and the police aren't there for the benefit of the every-person no matter where you live.

it's a nice bit of propaganda that they're there for us, but I urge anyone with that idea to seek out and research the history and origins of the modern police.

hint : in the US they first emerged as 'slave patrols', and then later modernized into 'industrial labor controls', and things weren't all that much better across the ocean in London with Sir Robert Peel and his version of the 'police service'.

[gottorf]

> the history and origins of the modern police

> in the US they first emerged as 'slave patrols'

> Sir Robert Peel and his version of the 'police service'

I assume that prior to the "modern" police, policing was still necessary, since there were lawbreakers and troublemakers since time immemorial. What do you regard as the substantive difference between the pre-modern police force and the modern? Did the former somehow serve "all of us" better than the latter?

[lazide]

Typically law enforcement was DIY, done by a mob, or done at the behest/in the interest of a local strongman (king or lord).

That led to extremely selective enforcement at the best of times.

The idea of a professional, independent force that served the public and preferred formal laws was the innovation.

Previously you’d need to either deal with it yourself, or track down a local patron and hope they cared enough to assign some muscle to deal with it on your behalf - and didn’t favor the perp more. Think ‘Godfather’. In those cases, written law was rarely a priority either.

[sneak]

Different local politicians won’t change the legal fact that the police have no obligation whatsoever to investigate or prevent crime. It’s simply not in the job description.

[9dev]

Err… what is their job, then, if not investigating and preventing crime? That pet theory with the slave patrols of yours, by the way, isn’t it; that’s a hoax. The modern police in the USA and other countries stems from the British police, which did exactly what they are supposed to do, since ages.

[sneak]

The police are the enforcement arm of the ownership class.

They apply the law as required to enforce the the socioeconomic order. This is why when people who aren’t custodians of land or cash flows ask them to investigate or solve crimes they rarely do.

The selective application of the law is how the current prerogatives of the ownership class are implemented in society.

This is why it’s illegal to do cocaine at work if you’re a poor person flipping burgers, but not if you’re an investment banker.

[dennis_jeeves2]

We need humans 2.0 for that to happen.

[throwaway48476]

Better to get rid of the police and let people get actual justice themselves.

[DaSHacka]

I'm sure that would end wonderfully.

[throwaway48476]

It worked for thousands of years.

[GeekyBear]

It depends on the city.

> Police to give out free air tag tracking devices to combat rise in stolen vehicles

https://www.princewilliamtimes.com/news/police-to-give-out-f...

[wahnfrieden]

They will at best waste your time, and at worst they will cause you and your family harm for involving them. In Toronto even a stolen car is not enough to get their attention if you are not a high-profile business owner.

[bagels]

At best they will help you with stolen property, but that is rare.

[wahnfrieden]

Mythically rare. They're more likely to steal from you.

[MagicMoonlight]

Please evidence this claim.

I know it’s false in the UK and I’d imagine it is false in any country where the law is based on UK law.

Failing to retrieve it at the time is going to mean losing it forever. If you find a crackhead with your phone and wait for someone else to retrieve it, that phone is long gone.

[harha]

Some jurisdictions are great at protecting all the wrong people

[Nakagawa835]

Helpful knowledge, thanks!

[wouldbecouldbe]

the police often won't do anything