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If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. I have no idea how any rational person (or court, especially) could

If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. I have no idea how any rational person (or court, especially) could conclude it would be theft to remove the tracker. It's good to see some sanity.

xwdv 5y ago
Fuck the state. It’s your tax money.
danaris 5y ago
Unfortunately, while that's certainly common sense, I very much doubt that there's any actual law or jurisprudence that supports it, whether the perpetrator is a police officer or a private citizen. This is almost certainly yet another place where the law simply hasn't caught up to the technology available.
- munk-a 5y ago
  It'd be interesting to see how this might shake out related to lost-and-found precedent - I bet there's some insight there. If you find a sweater abandoned in the woods and take it home I'd assume that isn't stealing unless there was a reasonable case to be made that the article of clothing was recently discarded - but if someone comes looking for it or puts up fliers that may change the math on that. This is essentially the same idea - something was left on your car, potentially maliciously even.
  - danaris 5y ago
    It's an interesting point, though I wonder how the intentionality would play into it. Malicious or not, it's hard to argue that someone who places a tracker (or a bomb!) on your car has "lost" it, as opposed to knowing exactly where it is and wanting it there for specific purposes.
- slowmovintarget 5y ago
  In this case the law is just fine. The State Supreme Court ruled, essentially, that you can't put an object in someone's car and accuse them of theft if they remove it. The court invalidated search warrants issued based on that faulty assertion.
  - TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
    The argument was more that it was a constitutional violation - search of property without probable cause. The police conveniently assumed the device was stolen, and used that as a pretext to search someone's home and advance an investigation that was the reason for the tracker being fitted in the first place. They didn't consider that the device might have been lost, and the suggestion that it was stolen was never a good one. ("One used tracking device for sale. Contact owner...")
munk-a 5y ago
I disagree that it'd be safe to assume that the police forfeited ownership so if they claim the device is theirs it makes sense to return the device. However the article pointed out (and it's pretty reasonable honestly) that when the woman first found the device she didn't know what it was and was concerned it might be a bomb. Given that someone has attached a device to your car without informing you of the intent of that device I think it's perfectly fair to destroy the device - if someone asks for the device returned you can explain the situation and, as long as you didn't clearly know what the device was (i.e. have search history for that exact tracker device or have testimony from a mechanic or technician who advised you on what the device is) then I think it'd be extremely difficult for you to be found at any fault. Car bombs are a thing that happens, they happen thankfully quite rarely but destroying a suspicious device is probably the best general course of action. Edit to add: I think there's also no reason to believe that someone planting a tracking device on your vehicle is working with law enforcement - it could easily be a stalker or someone acting maliciously. This actually seems like really risky behavior for the cops if they ever want the device back - I'd assume the devices they actually get returned are by pure luck alone.
- DangitBobby 5y ago
  I just became slightly enraged and irrational at the idea that I could potentially be stalked by hostile police, and any defensive behavior could result in them misrepresenting my behavior in a legal setting and successfully convicting me.
  - munk-a 5y ago
    If you're walking down an alley one night and someone grabs you and you punch them any reasonable court will find assault charges levied against you completely bogus. Unless... that person is a police officer, then you could be charged with and likely be convicted of assaulting an officer. Police officers in America, and most other countries, need to adhere to a completely different and much more lax set of rules than most people - that's partially for a good reason due to the line of work they're in - but some people do abuse it and leverage law enforcement privileges and equipment to abuse random folks. Like, for instance, planting a tracking device on your partner to see if they're cheating on you - probably illegal and IA will probably come down on that officer - but they're much more likely to get away with it scott free.
catblast01 5y ago
Not exactly how this works though. If the tracker was attached with a legitimate warrant your “consent” is irrelevant. It sounds like the Indiana ruling was more about intent to steal and not some issue of ownership, which is a distinct difference.
CoastalCoder 5y ago
> If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. Are you stating your personal take on the issue, or what the laws and courts have decided?
- DangitBobby 5y ago
  My personal take.
  - munk-a 5y ago
    I mentioned more details in a different comment but I think your personal take is quite wrong legally speaking - I do sympathize with where you're coming from but, if you ever find a strange device affixed to you can probably safely destroy it unless there are any clear markings indicating ownership (i.e. a giant blue badge) - and if there are feel free to forcefully return it to the police because you're uncertain if it may have been tampered with.
    - dylan604 5y ago
      Like the "Made in USA" stamped on the giant underwater phone line tapping machine on Russian phone lines?
      - munk-a 5y ago
        If I found a box in my backyard that said "Property of <local> police department" - my first step would be to phone them up and ask them to remove it. If they denied that it was theirs then I'd suspect foul play. It may be a touch naive of me but I'll tend to give the benefit of the doubt to identifying tags.
        dylan604 5y ago
        From The Wire, Prop Joe suggests to Marlow to "steal that shit." If it's local police, they'll come looking for it. If it's the feds, they'll just write it off. "steal that shit and see who comes a callin"
dheera 5y ago
They should make more vehicles that spew fart spray in all directions if the vehicle is touched in any way without the owner's key being within some range. Would stop tracker attempts, unauthorized tow trucks that don't make attempts to contact the owner first, and thieves alike.
- newsbinator 5y ago
  It's bad enough I have to wake up to people's cars breaking noise ordinances at 3am when a cat jumps on the hood or a heavy truck happens to drive by. Now I have to get sprayed with fart spray when a random guy touches a random car as I'm walking by?
  - dheera 5y ago
    That only makes the security system even stronger, because now the random guy not only gets sprayed by fart spray but also gets beaten up by you, and my car is even better protected. And knowing that, the random guy will be even more afraid to mess with random cars.
    - newsbinator 5y ago
      What's in it for me? I intentionally don't have a car and I don't feel any obligation to protect yours for you. All I get is the negative consequences of the decisions of strangers who do want cars.
      - dheera 5y ago
        Oh I mean, my bike can spray fart spray too. I've had 2 bikes stolen before, and wished they doused their thieves in fart spray. What's in it for you? Thieves fear fart spray and stop stealing stuff, and they'll also stop stealing whatever other assets you have or plan to have.
- rhizome 5y ago
  I'm sure fart spray wouldn't keep you from being charged under any number of booby-trap laws.
COGlory 5y ago
Courts have ruled chalking tires by meter maids to be trespassing. I'm not sure the final verdict on that, though.
- gnicholas 5y ago
  Yeah, I think this case [1] unfortunately just encouraged cities to adopt electronic license plate readers, or manual entry of plates by the police. From a civil liberties perspective, that's probably a step in the wrong direction. 1: https://www.npr.org/2019/04/23/716248823/court-says-using-chalk-on-tires-for-parking-enforcement-violates-constitution https://www.npr.org/2019/04/23/716248823/court-says-using-ch...
mikro2nd 5y ago
The law is not necessarily rational. A court must follow the law, not justice nor rationality. Sorry.
- mbg721 5y ago
  If we have constructed a law that everyone agrees is total garbage, we should fix the law. If we cannot fix the law, as I dread is true in this case, we have huge problems.
  - BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
    And that’s when it gets really depressing because it comes down to politicians doing the right thing.
dkdk8283 5y ago
Throw it in the garbage. Let them dig it out on garbage day.
- tyingq 5y ago
  I'd put it in the dog dropping bin at my local park.
- kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
  Mail it to another police department as far away as possible.
squarefoot 5y ago
> If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. I doubt so, at least with the special powers (and immunity) they have. That would be like saying that if they fly a drone into my property I could shoot it down and salvage its parts. I'd probably be jailed for destroying police property although it's their device that was actually trespassing. It's a complex matter, but with police involved in one side one should expect to lose anyway.
- DebtDeflation 5y ago
  I think the issue is taking the tracker inside your garage/house where the police can track it (it is a tracker after all) while in your possession. A better approach would be to pull over into the shoulder on the highway, remove it there, leave it on the side of the road, and drive off. Then if they want it they can drive out to go get it. "Sorry officer, it must've just fallen off my car while I was driving."
  - caf 5y ago
    If you really want to cause some paperwork, drive it to Canada and leave it there.
glitchc 5y ago
I don't think the Supreme Court ruling draws this conclusion. All it contends is that an individual cannot be charged of theft if the individual did not know that they were stealing in the first place. The ruling leaves the door open to charge the individual with a different crime (failure to comply with a warrant) or even civil proceedings. You are making a "if I own the wallet, I also own its contents" argument. It doesn't fly unfortunately, and for that matter has never flown. Possession isn't the same as ownership. This is even more so true if you have knowledge of the source of the contents. How else would we catch thieves if it were?
- fastglass 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possession_(law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possession_(law) >Like ownership, the possession of anything is commonly regulated by country under property law. In all cases, to possess something, a person must have an intention to possess it. Custody might be a more appropriate term to use against ownership.
ineptech 5y ago
> I have no idea how any rational person... There's no reason to expect the law to be rational or objective. Why is it a felony when I steal from my employer, but a civil suit when they steal from me? Because that's what the people who wrote the laws wanted. Applying the same reasoning to this case, I'd be shocked if the courts don't decide that the police have the legal right to reclaim their tracking device.
- BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
  There’s also a precedent that things like car boots, wheel locks, and windshield barnacles are still property of the state and destroying or tampering with them is a crime. Even if you manage to remove them safely the government still expects the mechanism back.
lordlimecat 5y ago
Not only did they have a warrant, but illegally tracking you (e.g. without said warrant) does not forfeit ownership of the device. You could have cause to sue them while also breaking the law for stealing their device; no one should trust your interpretation of the law, because it is wrong in every jurisdiction I’ve heard of it being tried.

xwdv 5y ago

Fuck the state. It’s your tax money.

danaris 5y ago

Unfortunately, while that's certainly common sense, I very much doubt that there's any actual law or jurisprudence that supports it, whether the perpetrator is a police officer or a private citizen. This is almost certainly yet another place where the law simply hasn't caught up to the technology available.

munk-a 5y ago
It'd be interesting to see how this might shake out related to lost-and-found precedent - I bet there's some insight there. If you find a sweater abandoned in the woods and take it home I'd assume that isn't stealing unless there was a reasonable case to be made that the article of clothing was recently discarded - but if someone comes looking for it or puts up fliers that may change the math on that. This is essentially the same idea - something was left on your car, potentially maliciously even.
- danaris 5y ago
  It's an interesting point, though I wonder how the intentionality would play into it. Malicious or not, it's hard to argue that someone who places a tracker (or a bomb!) on your car has "lost" it, as opposed to knowing exactly where it is and wanting it there for specific purposes.
slowmovintarget 5y ago
In this case the law is just fine. The State Supreme Court ruled, essentially, that you can't put an object in someone's car and accuse them of theft if they remove it. The court invalidated search warrants issued based on that faulty assertion.
- TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
  The argument was more that it was a constitutional violation - search of property without probable cause. The police conveniently assumed the device was stolen, and used that as a pretext to search someone's home and advance an investigation that was the reason for the tracker being fitted in the first place. They didn't consider that the device might have been lost, and the suggestion that it was stolen was never a good one. ("One used tracking device for sale. Contact owner...")

munk-a 5y ago

I disagree that it'd be safe to assume that the police forfeited ownership so if they claim the device is theirs it makes sense to return the device. However the article pointed out (and it's pretty reasonable honestly) that when the woman first found the device she didn't know what it was and was concerned it might be a bomb. Given that someone has attached a device to your car without informing you of the intent of that device I think it's perfectly fair to destroy the device - if someone asks for the device returned you can explain the situation and, as long as you didn't clearly know what the device was (i.e. have search history for that exact tracker device or have testimony from a mechanic or technician who advised you on what the device is) then I think it'd be extremely difficult for you to be found at any fault. Car bombs are a thing that happens, they happen thankfully quite rarely but destroying a suspicious device is probably the best general course of action. Edit to add: I think there's also no reason to believe that someone planting a tracking device on your vehicle is working with law enforcement - it could easily be a stalker or someone acting maliciously. This actually seems like really risky behavior for the cops if they ever want the device back - I'd assume the devices they actually get returned are by pure luck alone.

DangitBobby 5y ago
I just became slightly enraged and irrational at the idea that I could potentially be stalked by hostile police, and any defensive behavior could result in them misrepresenting my behavior in a legal setting and successfully convicting me.
- munk-a 5y ago
  If you're walking down an alley one night and someone grabs you and you punch them any reasonable court will find assault charges levied against you completely bogus. Unless... that person is a police officer, then you could be charged with and likely be convicted of assaulting an officer. Police officers in America, and most other countries, need to adhere to a completely different and much more lax set of rules than most people - that's partially for a good reason due to the line of work they're in - but some people do abuse it and leverage law enforcement privileges and equipment to abuse random folks. Like, for instance, planting a tracking device on your partner to see if they're cheating on you - probably illegal and IA will probably come down on that officer - but they're much more likely to get away with it scott free.

catblast01 5y ago

Not exactly how this works though. If the tracker was attached with a legitimate warrant your “consent” is irrelevant. It sounds like the Indiana ruling was more about intent to steal and not some issue of ownership, which is a distinct difference.

CoastalCoder 5y ago

> If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. Are you stating your personal take on the issue, or what the laws and courts have decided?

DangitBobby 5y ago
My personal take.
- munk-a 5y ago
  I mentioned more details in a different comment but I think your personal take is quite wrong legally speaking - I do sympathize with where you're coming from but, if you ever find a strange device affixed to you can probably safely destroy it unless there are any clear markings indicating ownership (i.e. a giant blue badge) - and if there are feel free to forcefully return it to the police because you're uncertain if it may have been tampered with.
  - dylan604 5y ago
    Like the "Made in USA" stamped on the giant underwater phone line tapping machine on Russian phone lines?
    - munk-a 5y ago
      If I found a box in my backyard that said "Property of <local> police department" - my first step would be to phone them up and ask them to remove it. If they denied that it was theirs then I'd suspect foul play. It may be a touch naive of me but I'll tend to give the benefit of the doubt to identifying tags.
      - dylan604 5y ago
        From The Wire, Prop Joe suggests to Marlow to "steal that shit." If it's local police, they'll come looking for it. If it's the feds, they'll just write it off. "steal that shit and see who comes a callin"

dheera 5y ago

They should make more vehicles that spew fart spray in all directions if the vehicle is touched in any way without the owner's key being within some range. Would stop tracker attempts, unauthorized tow trucks that don't make attempts to contact the owner first, and thieves alike.

newsbinator 5y ago
It's bad enough I have to wake up to people's cars breaking noise ordinances at 3am when a cat jumps on the hood or a heavy truck happens to drive by. Now I have to get sprayed with fart spray when a random guy touches a random car as I'm walking by?
- dheera 5y ago
  That only makes the security system even stronger, because now the random guy not only gets sprayed by fart spray but also gets beaten up by you, and my car is even better protected. And knowing that, the random guy will be even more afraid to mess with random cars.
  - newsbinator 5y ago
    What's in it for me? I intentionally don't have a car and I don't feel any obligation to protect yours for you. All I get is the negative consequences of the decisions of strangers who do want cars.
    - dheera 5y ago
      Oh I mean, my bike can spray fart spray too. I've had 2 bikes stolen before, and wished they doused their thieves in fart spray. What's in it for you? Thieves fear fart spray and stop stealing stuff, and they'll also stop stealing whatever other assets you have or plan to have.
rhizome 5y ago
I'm sure fart spray wouldn't keep you from being charged under any number of booby-trap laws.

COGlory 5y ago

Courts have ruled chalking tires by meter maids to be trespassing. I'm not sure the final verdict on that, though.

gnicholas 5y ago
Yeah, I think this case [1] unfortunately just encouraged cities to adopt electronic license plate readers, or manual entry of plates by the police. From a civil liberties perspective, that's probably a step in the wrong direction. 1: https://www.npr.org/2019/04/23/716248823/court-says-using-chalk-on-tires-for-parking-enforcement-violates-constitution https://www.npr.org/2019/04/23/716248823/court-says-using-ch...

mikro2nd 5y ago

The law is not necessarily rational. A court must follow the law, not justice nor rationality. Sorry.

mbg721 5y ago
If we have constructed a law that everyone agrees is total garbage, we should fix the law. If we cannot fix the law, as I dread is true in this case, we have huge problems.
- BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
  And that’s when it gets really depressing because it comes down to politicians doing the right thing.

dkdk8283 5y ago

Throw it in the garbage. Let them dig it out on garbage day.

tyingq 5y ago
I'd put it in the dog dropping bin at my local park.
kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
Mail it to another police department as far away as possible.

squarefoot 5y ago

> If you have attached a device to my vehicle without my consent, you've forfeited ownership. I doubt so, at least with the special powers (and immunity) they have. That would be like saying that if they fly a drone into my property I could shoot it down and salvage its parts. I'd probably be jailed for destroying police property although it's their device that was actually trespassing. It's a complex matter, but with police involved in one side one should expect to lose anyway.

DebtDeflation 5y ago
I think the issue is taking the tracker inside your garage/house where the police can track it (it is a tracker after all) while in your possession. A better approach would be to pull over into the shoulder on the highway, remove it there, leave it on the side of the road, and drive off. Then if they want it they can drive out to go get it. "Sorry officer, it must've just fallen off my car while I was driving."
- caf 5y ago
  If you really want to cause some paperwork, drive it to Canada and leave it there.

glitchc 5y ago

I don't think the Supreme Court ruling draws this conclusion. All it contends is that an individual cannot be charged of theft if the individual did not know that they were stealing in the first place. The ruling leaves the door open to charge the individual with a different crime (failure to comply with a warrant) or even civil proceedings. You are making a "if I own the wallet, I also own its contents" argument. It doesn't fly unfortunately, and for that matter has never flown. Possession isn't the same as ownership. This is even more so true if you have knowledge of the source of the contents. How else would we catch thieves if it were?

fastglass 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possession_(law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possession_(law) >Like ownership, the possession of anything is commonly regulated by country under property law. In all cases, to possess something, a person must have an intention to possess it. Custody might be a more appropriate term to use against ownership.

ineptech 5y ago

> I have no idea how any rational person... There's no reason to expect the law to be rational or objective. Why is it a felony when I steal from my employer, but a civil suit when they steal from me? Because that's what the people who wrote the laws wanted. Applying the same reasoning to this case, I'd be shocked if the courts don't decide that the police have the legal right to reclaim their tracking device.

BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
There’s also a precedent that things like car boots, wheel locks, and windshield barnacles are still property of the state and destroying or tampering with them is a crime. Even if you manage to remove them safely the government still expects the mechanism back.

lordlimecat 5y ago

Not only did they have a warrant, but illegally tracking you (e.g. without said warrant) does not forfeit ownership of the device. You could have cause to sue them while also breaking the law for stealing their device; no one should trust your interpretation of the law, because it is wrong in every jurisdiction I’ve heard of it being tried.