[jkaplowitz]

> If you benefit from receiving stolen property, does the law force you to return it?

The general answer to that is: it depends on a lot of factors, but sometimes yes and sometimes no. The specific answer varies between jurisdictions, I think even between different US states and certainly between countries. It's often relevant whether you knew or should reasonably have known at the time of purchase that the property was stolen.

[em-bee]

well it depends, if you buy a car stolen from me, then i should get the car back, no matter what. if you didn't know that it was stolen, you have a claim against the person who sold you the car, but not me. but if that person can't return the money, then you are out of luck, just as when you are falling for a scam. not your fault, but your damage nontheless.

[jkaplowitz]

As I said, not every jurisdiction follows the rule you describe for all types of property and all types of illicit transfers. After all, innocent purchaser victims are just as non-culpable as innocent theft victims, and society doesn't always decide to prioritize the original owner's ease of having the maximum number of people to sue for recovery over the reliability of that jurisdiction as a place to innocently buy things without fear of unexpectedly being sued by a third party.

To be clear, I'm not expressing any kind of personal opinion here - I'm saying how the world actually works. Sometimes that matches what you are advocating, but sometimes not.

Of course, in both the mindset you advocate and in the other mindset, you have a claim against the person who stole your car, for sure, as well as anyone else who knowingly trafficked in the stolen goods.

Sometimes the relevant rules are different for real property vs personal property, and sometimes it matters whether the property's ownership has been registered in some register which the purchaser can verify before purchase. I don't think US car title records are generally publicly verifiable.

It's also usually relevant how the property was stolen - theft in the sense of actual larceny often has harsher consequences for the eventual bona fide purchaser (and more protections for the original owner) than if the property was stolen by fraudulently inducing the original owner to sign a deed of sale.

I'm avoiding giving specifics here because, again, the details vary by jurisdiction and by the particular facts and circumstances.