Please Help Stop A Fountain Pen Thief/fence - Ebay User Dort1463

[welch]

 

Transferring stolen goods. I'm pretty sure it's the same in Canada, and I wouldn't wonder that diverse states have kept it in place. That Latin tag I used earlier is "you cannot give what you don't have" is in law specifically because it doesn't matter how many hands a thing passes through; the thief had ho rights in it, so no one down the chain does, either.

 

I believe we have the same law in the US. It is illegal to sell stolen property. If you can demonstrate that you bought the item "in good faith", you won't be prosecuted. However, police and FBI always try to nail someone who "fences" stolen goods, who does it as a living.

 

I sat on a Federal jury about 25 years ago in which a person had bought a Mercedes sports car in Pennsylvania using a fake banker's check...back before electronic payments and such. He re-sold the car to a dealer in New York for $2,500 and an old Pontiac. FBI searched for the car, but the dealer had sold the car to a couple in Manhattan.

 

Judge decided that the car belonged to the Manhattan couple because it had been acquired by deception but not stolen from the Pennsylvania people. A subtle distinction that we, on the jury, thought unfair since the FBI had visited the NY dealer when the car was being re-painted. Dealer said, "We don't have the car", explaining to us that he did not, then, have title to the car, although he had physical possession. We thought that the dealer "should" have suspected a person selling a $100,000 sports car for $2500 and a well used Pontiac, but the judge disagreed.

 

Anyway, it seems to be a crime in California and anyplace else to sell something stolen.

 

Good luck!