Police Confiscation of Suspected Stolen Property

**cdwjava** · 01-09-2011, 10:17 AM

The fact that you do not understand why the police can take it is not the issue. They can. It is potential evidence of a crime. Your recourse now is to sue the guy who sold it to you. But I suspect that the cost of the item is such that it probably is not worth the time and effort, is it?

Quoting goldengloves

It also seems fishy that only one sheriff was assigned to the case. The suspected buyer's house was broken into so he said, I didn't know street cops followed out home invasion cases, solo none the less...

It depends on the agency. In most police agencies, one detective is assigned to a crime - not a team. Unlike TV real police agencies do not have the luxury of working one case at a time - they work several. In property crimes they may work a couple dozen or more at one time.

In smaller agencies, a single beat officer may take the investigation if it is not a serious violent crime. Heck, I am a supervisor and I have a case load myself.

Nothing you have written smacks of anything out of the ordinary in these sorts of cases. A victim reports a theft, describes the item, we or he catches it on Craigslist, and a plan is made to intercept and retrieve the item from either the thief (the usual result) or someone who may have bought it from the thief (the rare occurrence).

**goldengloves** · 01-09-2011, 10:56 AM

It was almost a grand, but as you said the time and effort aren't going to be worth the headache I've got a lot of other stuff going on. The officer kept telling me how ****ed up it was he had to take it and he believes in what I was telling him, but we eventually both shook hands and agreed he didn't make the laws only that he has to follow them. The officer also had told me that when they catch the guy if he's sentenced I'd be entitled to possibly getting my money back through the victims panel, but he then confused me with talk about me taking the guy to small claims court which I'm not going to do. This shit sucks but I guess that's life, no more craigslisting without getting items notarized for future reference.