Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion sign thief !!! oldgas member !!! Wanna know who ?

I called a lawyer to ask if i had to give it back. I was told it did not belong to me and the owner should get it back. Lucky for me i had the MI State Police help me get my money back. All i wanted was my money back and he got restitution for it.
I wasn't trying to make money... i sent police the ebay listing where i bought it and what i paid.

cosdencop, Thanks for the heads up! innocent untill proven guilty... 1 sign or 2 maybe but 8 signs and equipment also. You know the saying if it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck it most likely is a duck. LOL I will stay clear of him!

I caught a reputable antiques dealer years ago stealing a sign. They owner did not want to go to court and no charges were filed.I found out later that he and several others "stole" stuff all the time(signs off old stores, rail road crossbucks, etc.). They swapped, traded, and sold the stuff like it was nobody's business.They did not steal from people they knew and so it was ok? Go figure.
Let the judicial system sort it out, but always beware of dealing with these types.It can come back to bite you and who needs the headache.
Dave

with what the prices of signs go for these days, of course theres gonna be low life scum stealing them. they can make a weeks wages off a sign. somebody broke into my storage behind my house and got 3 signs and two bikes. i now have a alarm system.

"All i wanted was my money back and he got restitution for it."
I'm not sure exactly what this means. I hope Jarvis is telling us that the person who initially stole the globe was forced to make restitution to the rightful owner and to Jarvis for his expenses.
At any rate, happy endings like these are rare. Usually the last buyer is the one who gets stuck when a stolen item is traced to him.
As for antique dealers who "liberate" signs and re-sell them, every collecting community has those kinds of bad actors. It's best to share such information among your collector friends, so they won't end up on the wrong end of a deal like Jarvis did here. Most of us in this area know who to avoid dealing with. I'm sure it's the same with other locales. One more caution, however. Make sure you have your facts straight. Accusing someone of being a thief or a felon is usually actionable as either slander (spoken) or libel (written). In these days of modern times with the Internet and other forms of electronic communication, a defamation can be repeated over and over. Each publication (in its broadest sense) is another tort. And all should be aware that repeating an accusation, even if you don't know the people involved, is, in and of itself, a new defamation for which you can be held liable. "I was just repeating what I was told . . ." is not a defense in court.

Steve; exactly why I haven't said anything about this topic and probably won't, but I'm watching closely. ;;;;;;;;;Ron

Steve, yes the person that stole the globe was to repay the original owner for the globe per the MI State police. I cleaned it up and put it on w new body. Looked better when he got it back then before. LOL

Again mine was a eBay buy and i was contacted 8 months later when the guy got busted and MSP found all his stuff on his computer of what he had stole and sold and to who.
I always wonder what would have happen if I had sold it?

The only exception to all of this I can think of off hand is something termed "stream of commerce." That is to say if you are an innocent purchaser for value of goods from someone who regularly sells that type of item and it turns out to be stolen, you usually can retain the merchandise.
This applies, for example, to an appliance dealer who makes a deal for 50 stolen refrigerators. As a purchaser in his store you as the consumer have a right to rely on his implied representation that goods he offers for sale to the public have been legitimately purchased by him. He can be prosecuted for "receiving or concealing", but you as an innocent purchaser for value, i.e., at or near a reasonable retail price, have no criminal liability and do obtain title to the merchandise. In Jarvis' case, had he resold the globe, the next purchaser would have had to give it up as Jarvis can't possibly be deemed a regular dealer of such an item as an antique gas pump globe even if he sells 40 a year. These collectibles are not the sort of items that are considered to be "in the stream of commerce."

Somebody's been studying their UCCs I just had a bad law school flashback!

Thats alot, I know what its like to get ripped off, two times I moved and had someone break in the house during the process. When moving it seems to be when this happens to me.

Sorry to hear that, there is no worse feeling than being ripped off by a burglar.

yep

And is there such a thing as a "good" law school flashback?
I doubt it!