Man charged with theft for removing police GPS tracker from his car

Cops tracked the man's car because they suspected he was dealing meth.

Read the whole story

 

[Mr. Fusion]

Some of these comments imply that removing a tracker with warrant would somehow be illegal. The logic being that removing it removes polices ability track you and that would be theft as it is part of the value of the tracking device.

But nobody as far as I see has pointed out the 5th, right not to self incriminate yourself. Leaving it in the car would expose yourself at least to traffic violations.

That is, unfortunately, one of the most misunderstood parts of the Constitution.

All the "right to not incriminate yourself" means is you do not have to testify in a court or talk to the police on a criminal complaint. The police /prosecutor may use any document you have created, anything on your computer or phone, if you have spoken over a tapped phone, whatever you have told anyone, and even that bloody knife in your pocket. BUT, you don't need to talk to them about it.

Here, the tracker would not have gathered any evidence. It would have shown the police where he went and possible customers and suppliers. All the tracker would have done is improve their drug world intelligence.

 

[Mr. Fusion]

Ignorance of a law is not a valid defense for breaking it. You have the responsibility to be aware of and follow the law at all times.

This is exactly why we have trial by jury, and hope judges exercise some common sense in applying the law. Otherwise, a draconian police state develops where ever-more-complex laws are passed that no one, even a full-time professional studying them, can possibly have memorized.

The standard most people, not lawyers, apply to laws is that they are valid and should be respected if they agree with and support community standards of behavior toward one another well enough to make things work out fairly for everyone.

If laws do not meet this minimal standard of reasonableness and fairness, courts can claim it is necessary to ruthlessly apply the letter of even horrible laws to every situation. But if the laws are obviously unjust and unreasonably oppressive, support for them will be rapidly eroded. When this happens, we all lose.

Ignorance of the law hasn't been a valid defense in western legal systems for centuries, and that's not about to change anytime soon.

You never get to a jury if your only defense is ignorance of the law, because that's not a valid defense. No defense means summary judgement, which the judge is bound to grant, so the judge can't help you either.

You fix unjust laws by changing the law via the legislature. We do this all the time. Judges can really only dodge the laws if something preempts it (ie, State/US Constitution, federal laws) or by using the leeway they have in sentencing.

Give it a rest. You have no idea what you are talking about.

Any time an accused demands a jury trial they get a jury trial. There is no summary judgement in a criminal trial.

Ignorance of the law is used quite often and is an accepted defense. Many laws require a mes rea before you can be found guilty. For example, murder requires that you intended to kill the person. If it was an accident then it is manslaughter instead of murder. Another example from above is the neighbor that leaves a rake on my lawn which I put in my shed versus being charged with robbery. Both examples require the accused know and understand that what they did was wrong.

No accused is bound to tell a judge what their defense is. It is the prosecution that is obligated to tell the defense what their evidence is. Some jurisdictions do require that the defense outline their witnesses and outside expert opinion, but they do not have to provide any exact evidence or response.

HINT: Youtube School of Law and Washing Machine Installation is not noted for their graduates.

 

[Mr. Fusion]

I don't think they particularly care about the theft charge.

The issue is the drug charges.

If the theft charge is thrown out as illegitimate, it follows that the warrant to search the home was illegitimate, and any evidence gathered by said search constitutes "fruit of the poisonous tree" and can't be used in court.

So this guy will walk on drug charges for which the police have hard evidence on a technicality.

That said, the police are wrong here. Their warrant was illegitimate, and all the evidence should be thrown out. Police conduct needs to be 100% aboveboard or their authority simply cannot be trusted.

One thing seems mysterious to me, a non US, non lawyer bod: if one can get together sufficient reason to place a tracker on someone's car, why wouldn't that also be sufficient reason for a search warrant? I appreciate that there's obviously some difference between the two in the US, otherwise there'd not be this fuss, but I'd be grateful for the explanation.

There is a difference between the two warrants. The car tracker warrant is for "fishing", not for proving or gathering material evidence. The police believe that the suspect might be going to shady places to do illegal deeds, however they are less sure of finding anything in their house. A house search warrant might produce nothing and on top of that tip the suspect off and make them "go dark".

If the police like their odds better they will skip the car tracker warrant and apply directly for a house search warrant. In this case they obviously didn't like their odds so much, so they feigned this supposed "theft" to manufacture probable cause out of thin air.

There is no difference in the amount of probable cause the police must provide for a tracker warrant, phone tap, or house search warrant. The pivotal case by the Supreme Court, "United States v Jones (2012)" pointed out that tracking a person's travels is every bit as intrusive as a home search warrant. The tracker can discover where he worships, how often he visits his physician, what political rallies he attends, where he shops, etc.

If the police had enough evidence to get the tracker warrant, then they had enough evidence for a drug search warrant. HOWEVER, it is very possible the magistrate applied a lower level of cause to put the tracker on than would justify a search warrant.

I agree that the theft charge was a ruse to access the property.

 

[Papewaio]

I can’t wait to see people shot by police charged with stealing bullets.

/s

 

[TMLutas]

It's not quite that simple.

The statute in Indiana is:

A person who knowingly or intentionally exerts unauthorized control over property of another person, with intent to deprive the other person of any part of its value or use, commits theft

The device clearly wasn't his, so he knowingly and intentionally exerted unauthorized control, and it was almost certainly to deprive whoever was tracking him of the use of the tracker. Check on all that for mens rea.

What this turns on is the "of another person" bit.

If you or I would have attached the tracker to his car, we would have - for various reasons - been likely considered to have "abandoned" the property and there'd be no theft. The big question here is whether or not that applies to the government, and the answer seems to be no.

The fact that the tracker wasn't labeled at all is, in my opinion, probably the only reason this has gone as far as it has. If it was labeled "Property of the Sheriff" and there was a law on the books (aka constructive notice) that the government retains property rights to placed GPS trackers, which it sounds like there is, this guy would be hosed.

If you have two classes of actors who can attach a GPS tracker device, one of which abandons their property rights when they do it and one of which doesn't, how is someone who discovers an attached GPS without clear identifier markings to determine which rules apply? No mens rea there.

But even with identifying marks, you still aren't entirely out of the constitutional woods yet. A warrant permitting the state to attach a GPS tracker doesn't impose any obligation on the subject of the search unless they are given a copy of the warrant that outlines their obligation. Without that sort of notice, how are they supposed to know that the warrant hasn't expired?

 

[Chilly8]

Note to self: If I ever find a GPS tracker on my car, wrap it in foil then mount it back on the car.

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

 

[Chilly8]

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

With its Internet connection jammed, it would be unable to report anything back, and they would never suspect that a jammer was being used.

Jamming cellular voice calls is illega, but jamming wireless Internet it not, so if he had done it that way, he would have broken no federal laws.

 

[Chilly8]

\

The fact that the tracker wasn't labeled at all is, in my opinion, probably the only reason this has gone as far as it has. If it was labeled "Property of the Sheriff" and there was a law on the books (aka constructive notice) that the government retains property rights to placed GPS trackers, which it sounds like there is, this guy would be hosed.

However, he could not be charged with a crime if he used a jammer to prevent it from working.

They would never suspect he was using a jammer

 

[Faanchou]

\

The fact that the tracker wasn't labeled at all is, in my opinion, probably the only reason this has gone as far as it has. If it was labeled "Property of the Sheriff" and there was a law on the books (aka constructive notice) that the government retains property rights to placed GPS trackers, which it sounds like there is, this guy would be hosed.

However, he could not be charged with a crime if he used a jammer to prevent it from working.

They would never suspect he was using a jammer

How, exactly, would that stop them from getting a warrant and raiding his home though?

 

[Cloudgazer]

I don't think they particularly care about the theft charge.

The issue is the drug charges.

If the theft charge is thrown out as illegitimate, it follows that the warrant to search the home was illegitimate, and any evidence gathered by said search constitutes "fruit of the poisonous tree" and can't be used in court.

So this guy will walk on drug charges for which the police have hard evidence on a technicality.

That said, the police are wrong here. Their warrant was illegitimate, and all the evidence should be thrown out. Police conduct needs to be 100% aboveboard or their authority simply cannot be trusted.

One thing seems mysterious to me, a non US, non lawyer bod: if one can get together sufficient reason to place a tracker on someone's car, why wouldn't that also be sufficient reason for a search warrant? I appreciate that there's obviously some difference between the two in the US, otherwise there'd not be this fuss, but I'd be grateful for the explanation.

There is a difference between the two warrants. The car tracker warrant is for "fishing", not for proving or gathering material evidence. The police believe that the suspect might be going to shady places to do illegal deeds, however they are less sure of finding anything in their house. A house search warrant might produce nothing and on top of that tip the suspect off and make them "go dark".

If the police like their odds better they will skip the car tracker warrant and apply directly for a house search warrant. In this case they obviously didn't like their odds so much, so they feigned this supposed "theft" to manufacture probable cause out of thin air.

There is no difference in the amount of probable cause the police must provide for a tracker warrant, phone tap, or house search warrant. The pivotal case by the Supreme Court, "United States v Jones (2012)" pointed out that tracking a person's travels is every bit as intrusive as a home search warrant. The tracker can discover where he worships, how often he visits his physician, what political rallies he attends, where he shops, etc.

If the police had enough evidence to get the tracker warrant, then they had enough evidence for a drug search warrant. HOWEVER, it is very possible the magistrate applied a lower level of cause to put the tracker on than would justify a search warrant.

I agree that the theft charge was a ruse to access the property.

You're confusing two different things. It may require exactly the same amount of probable cause to get a warrant on a house as on a gps tracker for a car, but that doesn't mean that the same evidence gives you probable cause for both.

Quoting the appeal court ruling:

Based on information from a confidential informant and their own observations, police believed that Heuring was using his vehicle to deal methamphetamine.

Those observations gave the police probable cause for the car. But since they hadn't observed him taking drugs into or out of the house, and since their confidential informant didn't have any information about the house, they didn't have probable cause for a warrant on the house.

Even if same amount of evidence would be needed in both cases, but it would still be different evidence.

 

[Chilly8]

\

The fact that the tracker wasn't labeled at all is, in my opinion, probably the only reason this has gone as far as it has. If it was labeled "Property of the Sheriff" and there was a law on the books (aka constructive notice) that the government retains property rights to placed GPS trackers, which it sounds like there is, this guy would be hosed.

However, he could not be charged with a crime if he used a jammer to prevent it from working.

They would never suspect he was using a jammer

How, exactly, would that stop them from getting a warrant and raiding his home though?

True they could raid your house, but they would find the GPS device still attached to his car, but would never figure out why the device quit working. They would never figure out he was jamming it.

They would just be stumped as to why the tracker was not working properly, when they found it still attached his car

 

[barrattm]

I don't think they particularly care about the theft charge.

The issue is the drug charges.

If the theft charge is thrown out as illegitimate, it follows that the warrant to search the home was illegitimate, and any evidence gathered by said search constitutes "fruit of the poisonous tree" and can't be used in court.

So this guy will walk on drug charges for which the police have hard evidence on a technicality.

That said, the police are wrong here. Their warrant was illegitimate, and all the evidence should be thrown out. Police conduct needs to be 100% aboveboard or their authority simply cannot be trusted.

One thing seems mysterious to me, a non US, non lawyer bod: if one can get together sufficient reason to place a tracker on someone's car, why wouldn't that also be sufficient reason for a search warrant? I appreciate that there's obviously some difference between the two in the US, otherwise there'd not be this fuss, but I'd be grateful for the explanation.

Also not a lawyer, and this has probably been covered in the multiple pages since you posted, but I can explain.

In the US, we have the 4th Amendment to the Constitution, which reads as follows:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I bolded the operative portion for effect. A warrant must specify what the police are looking for, and where they are looking for it, and they must have probable cause to believe that the thing they want is where they think it is. If they got a warrant to track the car it means they had probable cause to believe that the car was being used in the meth dealing operation. The lack of warrant for the house indicates that either a) the police didn't know the man's home address (and thus couldn't "particularly describe the place to be searched"), or b) the police didn't have any reason to believe he was dealing drugs out of his home (in which case the warrant is not merited "upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation").

I am also not a lawyer, but I have lived in the US my entire life.

Thanks for the reply. I suppose in the end it comes down to the real possibility (at the time before they searched it) that the home wasn’t involved in the drugs dealing. Knowing nothing about drugs dealing I presume that it doesn’t necessarily follow that, just because someone is selling drugs from a vehicle, their home is where they have to be keeping it. Hence the need to show that the home was involved prior to being granted a warrant to search it.

Much obliged!

 

[thinkreal]

As odd as it sounds, I'm definitely pulling for the drug dealer on this one. Although how stupid do you have to be to find and remove a GPS tracking device, and keep it?

I'm in the group that would advocate for it to be placed somewhere else, while still active. I was going to say a pizza delivery car. But odds are that would make the cops think the pizza place is a distribution center for drugs.

I had a motorcycle stolen. A year later I recognized it in the for sale pages, inspected, called the cops. Long chain of finger pointing, they got to the guy who took it... Had the number plate hanging on his wall
(Links in the chain included a pawnbroker and a dude in jail. Really was more trouble than the bike was worth, but Justice)

 

[Derecho Imminent]

I wonder how much he could have got on ebay.

 

[Adreaver]

I don't think they particularly care about the theft charge.

The issue is the drug charges.

If the theft charge is thrown out as illegitimate, it follows that the warrant to search the home was illegitimate, and any evidence gathered by said search constitutes "fruit of the poisonous tree" and can't be used in court.

So this guy will walk on drug charges for which the police have hard evidence on a technicality.

That said, the police are wrong here. Their warrant was illegitimate, and all the evidence should be thrown out. Police conduct needs to be 100% aboveboard or their authority simply cannot be trusted.

I think you are contradicting yourself. If the court rules that their warrant was "illegitimate" then this guy will not walk on drug charges due to a mere "technicality" but because their warrant was illegitimate.

I mean, it is a technicality. If acquitted, it won't be due to a lack of evidence, but due to the procedural details of how the evidence was collected.

Saying this is a technicality does not in any way imply that it was a trivial or unimportant detail.

Due process is of utmost importance.

 

[Derecho Imminent]

As odd as it sounds, I'm definitely pulling for the drug dealer on this one. Although how stupid do you have to be to find and remove a GPS tracking device, and keep it?

I'm in the group that would advocate for it to be placed somewhere else, while still active. I was going to say a pizza delivery car. But odds are that would make the cops think the pizza place is a distribution center for drugs.

I had a motorcycle stolen. A year later I recognized it in the for sale pages, inspected, called the cops. Long chain of finger pointing, they got to the guy who took it... Had the number plate hanging on his wall
(Links in the chain included a pawnbroker and a dude in jail. Really was more trouble than the bike was worth, but Justice)

Had a computer stolen once. The police had it in the evidence room from day 2, but didnt contact me for 6 months because it was part of an undercover sting operation. By the time I got it back I had already replaced it so it was pretty much useless. Plus filled with mouse poop from 6 months in their storage. But otoh, I got to testify in court that it was mine so I had the pleasure of seeing the thief convicted. Thats worth something.

 

[Karajorma]

While I in no way support the overreach by the government here, I'm amazed that this guy, having found a GPS tracker on his car, proceeded to keep meth AND the GPS tracker in his house. If you suspect the police are onto you to the point where you're pulling GPS trackers off your car, perhaps it might be time to give up dealing meth for a few weeks.

 

[psd]

While I in no way support the overreach by the government here, I'm amazed that this guy, having found a GPS tracker on his car, proceeded to keep meth AND the GPS tracker in his house. If you suspect the police are onto you to the point where you're pulling GPS trackers off your car, perhaps it might be time to give up dealing meth for a few weeks.

here is the logical explanation

 

[jazzylarry]

While I in no way support the overreach by the government here, I'm amazed that this guy, having found a GPS tracker on his car, proceeded to keep meth AND the GPS tracker in his house. If you suspect the police are onto you to the point where you're pulling GPS trackers off your car, perhaps it might be time to give up dealing meth for a few weeks.

I think I see the answer: he's using and dealing meth.

 

[klarg]

This is the state that wanted to legislate the value of pi.

 

[CactusPete]

Some of these comments imply that removing a tracker with warrant would somehow be illegal. The logic being that removing it removes polices ability track you and that would be theft as it is part of the value of the tracking device.

But nobody as far as I see has pointed out the 5th, right not to self incriminate yourself. Leaving it in the car would expose yourself at least to traffic violations.

That is, unfortunately, one of the most misunderstood parts of the Constitution.

All the "right to not incriminate yourself" means is you do not have to testify in a court or talk to the police on a criminal complaint. The police /prosecutor may use any document you have created, anything on your computer or phone, if you have spoken over a tapped phone, whatever you have told anyone, and even that bloody knife in your pocket. BUT, you don't need to talk to them about it.

Here, the tracker would not have gathered any evidence. It would have shown the police where he went and possible customers and suppliers. All the tracker would have done is improve their drug world intelligence.

I think the argument hinges on the fact that the dealer knew the device was there. It is impossible for him to continue normally at that point.

Also, it seems like this department could/would claim he deprived them of tracking by changing which car he used. You really have to suspend reality to agree with the prosecutor given all the possible extensions of that argument.

 

[Sulla]

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

A police tracker would not be connected to a car power source.

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

An illegal cell phone jammer hardly seems an improvement on the legality scale...

 

[Fritzr]

In his next case, the same lawyer argued that removing graffiti is vandalism.

The lawyer makes the arguments they're paid to make. In some respects, that's no better than getting angry at defense attorneys for doing their jobs.

I can almost guarantee you that the prosecutor here thinks this argument is just as ridiculous as you or I think it is. You don't jump through all these, "Technically..." hoops because you want to, you do it because you don't have any other options.

Actually the prosecutor has full control. The prosecutor's job is to review the charges and evidence and decide if it is a valid case. Charges are filed by the prosecutor. If the prosecutor declines to file charges, then the matter is closed until the police return with additional evidence and a new request for the prosecutor to file charges.

That said, prosecutors will file charges and aggressively fight for a conviction for things they readily admit are ridiculous. They need to maintain a "proper" image and demonstrate that they are doing a "good job" in order to retain their position as prosecutor.

Private prosecution is outlawed in US. The only people permitted to file criminal charges and take a case to trial are government prosecutors. Anyone else is required to gain the cooperation of a government prosecutor who can file the charges for them.

 

[science is good]

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

With its Internet connection jammed, it would be unable to report anything back, and they would never suspect that a jammer was being used.

Jamming cellular voice calls is illega, but jamming wireless Internet it not, so if he had done it that way, he would have broken no federal laws.

removed

 

[O/Siris]

In his next case, the same lawyer argued that removing graffiti is vandalism.

The lawyer makes the arguments they're paid to make. In some respects, that's no better than getting angry at defense attorneys for doing their jobs.

I can almost guarantee you that the prosecutor here thinks this argument is just as ridiculous as you or I think it is. You don't jump through all these, "Technically..." hoops because you want to, you do it because you don't have any other options.

Actually the prosecutor has full control. The prosecutor's job is to review the charges and evidence and decide if it is a valid case. Charges are filed by the prosecutor. If the prosecutor declines to file charges, then the matter is closed until the police return with additional evidence and a new request for the prosecutor to file charges.

That said, prosecutors will file charges and aggressively fight for a conviction for things they readily admit are ridiculous. They need to maintain a "proper" image and demonstrate that they are doing a "good job" in order to retain their position as prosecutor.

Private prosecution is outlawed in US. The only people permitted to file criminal charges and take a case to trial are government prosecutors. Anyone else is required to gain the cooperation of a government prosecutor who can file the charges for them.

I know this case is a criminal case, so true in that context, but just a note that this is not true for tort. I'll reiterate IANAL, but in thinking of cases like towing or booting illegally parked cars, that's not literal prosecution, but it's a kind of enforcement permitted by the property holder. And in some jurisdictions (I think) removing the boot is actually illegal.

Not sure that analogy works here.

 

[Chilly8]

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

A police tracker would not be connected to a car power source.

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

An illegal cell phone jammer hardly seems an improvement on the legality scale...

If the jammer jams data, and not voice, it is not illegal.

It is only illegal to jam cellulular voice calls.

Jamming wireless Internet is not illegal, and there are jammers that can jam data, but not voice,.

I know this becuase in the 6 years I have lived in the apartement I have lived in, I have had neighbors in the past that have used such jammers,

I had one guy once living in the aparment next to me, who would jam data during family dinnertime to keep his children off his cell phone Internet, but voice calls would still work.

There was also another neighbor, on ankle bracelet, was using such a jammer to prevent the device from reporting his weheabouts, where, again, data was jammed, but voice was unaffected.

The apartment manager told me at the time they were not anything illegal by jammnig data. I was told by her that nothing could done unless and until the jamming started having problems with voice calls.'

In short, it is not illegal until voice calls start getting affected.

 

[lewax00]

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

A police tracker would not be connected to a car power source.

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

An illegal cell phone jammer hardly seems an improvement on the legality scale...

If the jammer jams data, and not voice, it is not illegal.

It is only illegal to jam cellulular voice calls.

Jamming wireless Internet is not illegal, and there are jammers that can jam data, but not voice,.

I know this becuase in the 6 years I have lived in the apartement I have lived in, I have had neighbors in the past that have used such jammers,

I had one guy once living in the aparment next to me, who would jam data during family dinnertime to keep his children off his cell phone Internet, but voice calls would still work.

There was also another neighbor, on ankle bracelet, was using such a jammer to prevent the device from reporting his weheabouts, where, again, data was jammed, but voice was unaffected.

The apartment manager told me at the time they were not anything illegal by jammnig data. I was told by her that nothing could done unless and until the jamming started having problems with voice calls.'

In short, it is not illegal until voice calls start getting affected.

Your apartment manager is wrong, all of those jammers are illegal.

 

[rmgoat]

F--k meth dealers, but this needs to be overturned. Thanks, Warrick County Sheriff's Office, for letting a drug dealer get off because you f--ked this up.

Yup, very sad when you're rooting for the meth dealer

Oh, I'm not rooting for him. I'd very much like for him to rot or fry, which is why I'm so pissed at the cops in this case.

What's more important cops being held to the law in general or the conviction of a single meth dealer? Because that's what this case is about. Either a meth dealer goes free because the evidence is inadmissible, or the cops get a shiny new toy that enables them to circumvent all checks on search warrants.

One scumbag going free is a small price to keep the organization of scumbags that try to end run the law in check. Seriously, how can we respect the police when they can't even be bothered to obey the laws they are supposed to uphold?

"It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer." - English jurist William Blackstone in his seminal work, Commentaries on the Laws of England, published in the 1760s.

Benjamin Franklin went further arguing "it is better a hundred guilty persons should escape than one innocent person should suffer."

Other notable historical figures have worried more about punishing the guilty. For instance German chancellor Otto Von Bismarck is believed to have remarked: "it is better that ten innocent men suffer than one guilty man escape." Che Guevara and 20th century communist movements in China, Vietnam, and Cambodia, also employed similar reasoning.

Who's side are the police on?

 

[Chilly8]

Another way, if you find a tracking device on your car is to remove it and then smash it to pieces to destroy it and then throw the pieces in the river, to get rid of any evidence against you.

They could still raid your house, but if the tracking device is nowhere to be found, they would have to prove that you were the one who removed it.

 

[kb_]

So if you find one on your car, drop it at the nearest police station as a "lost and found" object !

 

[azazel1024]

I don’t know how theft is defined in the USA — and strongly suspect these particular police didn’t care anyway — but in the UK it involves a perpetrator being aware that they’re doing something dishonest, intending that the owners never get the thing back, and taking a concrete step that removes the owners’ control over the item in favour of the thief.

This case would appear to satisfy exactly zero of those criteria.

It should be the same here - commission of a crime generally requires "Mens rea" - the intention of wrongdoing. In this case the device is already in his possession. Moving it from his vehicle to his home cannot be said to intend theft.

It's not quite that simple.

The statute in Indiana is:

A person who knowingly or intentionally exerts unauthorized control over property of another person, with intent to deprive the other person of any part of its value or use, commits theft

The device clearly wasn't his, so he knowingly and intentionally exerted unauthorized control, and it was almost certainly to deprive whoever was tracking him of the use of the tracker. Check on all that for mens rea.

What this turns on is the "of another person" bit.

If you or I would have attached the tracker to his car, we would have - for various reasons - been likely considered to have "abandoned" the property and there'd be no theft. The big question here is whether or not that applies to the government, and the answer seems to be no.

The fact that the tracker wasn't labeled at all is, in my opinion, probably the only reason this has gone as far as it has. If it was labeled "Property of the Sheriff" and there was a law on the books (aka constructive notice) that the government retains property rights to placed GPS trackers, which it sounds like there is, this guy would be hosed.

Good argument and to me that's the only one where I see it standing up. Now of course sometimes there are laws and then there are ethical/moral laws.

IMHO if I find something on my property that isn't mine and I don't know who's it is, that's abandoned property. Now of course that is all a grey area. If its an abandoned car with tags on it, if I break a window, hot wire it and decide it is mine now...I've obviously stolen it. I made no effort to determine who's it is, which would hopefully be as simple as calling the police to report an abandoned vehicle on my property.

If I find an empty backpack sitting on my lawn with no label or anything on it...is the law to say I can't throw it away? Or claim it as mine? I've gotta leave it there and not touch it because the owner might come back for it some day? What if it is litter?

Now it sounds like the law makes it sound like it could be considered abandoned and you wouldn't be considered stealing it. That makes sense to me. There is no realistic way you can determine who owns it. Now if someone came and knocked on my door later that day, if I was still in possession, I can see how morally/ethically I should give the backpack back to the person. Maybe even legally if its within a reasonable time frame.

But the less valuable and/or harder it would be to identify the owner of a thing is, the more "abandoned property" law should apply.

If find a GPS tracker on my vehicle that isn't labeled, I sure as hell am not leaving it there. If I found a wireless camera sitting on a tree on my property, I am not simply just leaving it up. I don't particularly care if it is my neighbors, a stalker, some random hunter who is trying to poach on my property or the governments.

Now, if it has an easily identifiable label on it, like "Property of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources" I am giving them a call to ask where is the court order/warrant to place a remote video camera on my property and failing that, come get their property.

If there is no way to identify who's it is, then as far as I am concerned the property owner has lost the rights to their property if it is present on mine without my prior consent after some reasonable period of time. At a MINIMUM, you can't charge a person with theft if they are agreeable to return said property, but you lose the right to control where that property is located if you leave it on mine and fail to continue to exert control over it.

IE you leave that back on my front lawn, I am not simply leaving it there until you decide to come collect it. Gov't decides to leave a GPS tracker on my car, well I am removing it. They are happy to come collect it and if they'd like show me a warrant. They show me the warrant, well I guess legally they can place it back on my vehicle, but until then, how am I in the wrong removing it. Even if it DOES have a "Sherriff's department" label on it with a phone number, how do I know that the gov't legally attached it to my vehicle? It isn't like government agents NEVER do anything wrong or illegal. Or that someone isn't spoofing a government agent. I'll give it back I promise and I'll make an attempt to contact them if they make it possible.

At a minimum I hope like heck the Indiana Supreme Court strikes this conviction down, with harsh words.

 

[ABXYCD]

So what happens if I want to track someone else and start slapping "Property of the Government" stickers on the trackers I put on them?

 

[Adreaver]

So what happens if I want to track someone else and start slapping "Property of the Government" stickers on the trackers I put on them?

That would be a fraud charge against you, for impersonating a government officer.

 

[azazel1024]

I think the lack of a label is a boon to the defendant’s case.

Agreed.

Otherwise, if a person finds a tracker on their car, they must leave it there just in case it is owned by the police. That sounds like an undo burden on the public.

Disagree, they should remove the tracker and either turn it in to the police, or call the police to help remove it (assuming you are a law abiding citizen wanting the weird thing off your car), or remove it and leave it in a parking lot somewhere it can continue transmitting (assuming you are a drug dealer looking to get the tracker off your car).

Also, it is unreasonable to expect a normal person to know the law exists in the first place.

False, in all 50 states and most of the world.

Ignorance of a law is not a valid defense for breaking it. You have the responsibility to be aware of and follow the law at all times.

Edit: Downvotes? Really?

Your down votes are because in the US and most countries that inherited English common law (as well as many other at least Western European countries) Men Rea, meaning guilty mind, is a requirement of the law also. Now, there are many laws where you can be convicted without knowing you are violating the law. Also many laws are so basic and common knowledge you have to have a guilty mind short of insanity or severe mental disability.

I think we all know punching someone in the face is a crime. But did you know that eating ice cream on a Sunday on a public sidewalk is a crime?

TO BAD! To prison with you!

Now if we have a new law saying eating ice cream on a public sidewalk on a Sunday is a crime, and we publish it in the local newspaper and we put out fliers and post it here in there on utility poles and local ice cream shops have a sign up that you can't eat ice cream on a sidewalk, well the public is probably pretty darned well informed and you know not to eat ice cream, on a Sunday, while standing on a public sidewalk.

Examples that are a little more "down to Earth". In my state it is not illegal to pass in the right hand lane. But some states are. Should I have to educate my self on EVERY state law? Maybe neighboring states I might have educated myself, but if I am driving to California, should I have to look up every, single state that I am passing through to see if I can pass in the right lane? Or the distance I need to signal before turning. Or how long I can remain in the fast lane. Etc.

Some of those traffic laws are common sense and in common. EVERY state has a speed limit you must obey. Now the penalties vary, but they all have a speed limit. Every state you must come to a full and complete stop at a stop sign. Every state you must signal a turn (but not every state must you signal a lane change).

Etc. Now a resident of the state in which they have received a license should be expected to know the laws of their state. And they do sometimes change, and they are usually very well publicized when they change. For example, when no texting/handheld device laws get past, all states I am aware of put out a lot of stuff saying it is now banned. Between signage, news articles, etc. But a resident of another state just passing through?

Now I have zero idea the case law there, but I suspect its much softer on upholding tickets and what not for out of state drivers for what is a very state specific law (that isn't advertised much. Maryland where I live for example when you enter the state on most highways at least, and periodically on various roads has posted no handheld devices. So an out of state driver could reasonably expected to know they can't be texting on their cell phone while driving).

 

[ABXYCD]

If I found one, I'm not Fedexing it to Burma or something. That leaves tracking records at FedEx right back to the guy who mailed it. Nope, I'm heading down to the post office and stashing it under one of the mail trucks. The cops will see the GPS tracker going all over town and stopping at every house. Oh my God, scream the cops, we've got a city wide drug ring!

Better yet, attach it to the personal car of one of the police officers.

Take it to lost & found.

Better yet, leave it where it is and use another car.

EVEN better: attach it to another car.

Or just smash it with a hammer and bin it. As long as they can't prove you have it they can't prove you "stole" it.

Attach it to an actual goose and make it a real "wild goose chase" for some fun!

 

[Chilly8]

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

A police tracker would not be connected to a car power source.

.

Some trackers might use a car power source, if the tracker you find does use a car power source, than pulling out the accessory fuse can be done, and would not be breaking any laws.

This is likely why GPS based tolling has not yet been widely implemented. Someone could just pull out the fuse to the GPS box in their car, and the tracker would quit working, and the monitoring stations would have no idea what is happening.

If the police do put a tracker in your car, that does use the car's battery, you can disable its power source by doing this, and they will never have a clue what happened.

 

[Derecho Imminent]

So what happens if I want to track someone else and start slapping "Property of the Government" stickers on the trackers I put on them?

That would be a fraud charge against you, for impersonating a government officer.

You generally need to have evidence before you charge someone.

 

[science is good]

I think the lack of a label is a boon to the defendant’s case.

Agreed.

Otherwise, if a person finds a tracker on their car, they must leave it there just in case it is owned by the police. That sounds like an undo burden on the public.

Disagree, they should remove the tracker and either turn it in to the police, or call the police to help remove it (assuming you are a law abiding citizen wanting the weird thing off your car), or remove it and leave it in a parking lot somewhere it can continue transmitting (assuming you are a drug dealer looking to get the tracker off your car).

Also, it is unreasonable to expect a normal person to know the law exists in the first place.

False, in all 50 states and most of the world.

Ignorance of a law is not a valid defense for breaking it. You have the responsibility to be aware of and follow the law at all times.

Edit: Downvotes? Really?

Your down votes are because in the US and most countries that inherited English common law (as well as many other at least Western European countries) Men Rea, meaning guilty mind, is a requirement of the law also. Now, there are many laws where you can be convicted without knowing you are violating the law. Also many laws are so basic and common knowledge you have to have a guilty mind short of insanity or severe mental disability.

I think we all know punching someone in the face is a crime. But did you know that eating ice cream on a Sunday on a public sidewalk is a crime?

TO BAD! To prison with you!

Now if we have a new law saying eating ice cream on a public sidewalk on a Sunday is a crime, and we publish it in the local newspaper and we put out fliers and post it here in there on utility poles and local ice cream shops have a sign up that you can't eat ice cream on a sidewalk, well the public is probably pretty darned well informed and you know not to eat ice cream, on a Sunday, while standing on a public sidewalk.

Examples that are a little more "down to Earth". In my state it is not illegal to pass in the right hand lane. But some states are. Should I have to educate my self on EVERY state law? Maybe neighboring states I might have educated myself, but if I am driving to California, should I have to look up every, single state that I am passing through to see if I can pass in the right lane? Or the distance I need to signal before turning. Or how long I can remain in the fast lane. Etc.

Some of those traffic laws are common sense and in common. EVERY state has a speed limit you must obey. Now the penalties vary, but they all have a speed limit. Every state you must come to a full and complete stop at a stop sign. Every state you must signal a turn (but not every state must you signal a lane change).

Etc. Now a resident of the state in which they have received a license should be expected to know the laws of their state. And they do sometimes change, and they are usually very well publicized when they change. For example, when no texting/handheld device laws get past, all states I am aware of put out a lot of stuff saying it is now banned. Between signage, news articles, etc. But a resident of another state just passing through?

Now I have zero idea the case law there, but I suspect its much softer on upholding tickets and what not for out of state drivers for what is a very state specific law (that isn't advertised much. Maryland where I live for example when you enter the state on most highways at least, and periodically on various roads has posted no handheld devices. So an out of state driver could reasonably expected to know they can't be texting on their cell phone while driving).

Simple answer, you should know the traffic laws of the state you are driving in, period. If you don't know if passing on the right is legal where you are at, you don't pass on the right. If you get a ticket because you don't know the law, it is your fault. There should be no leaway, you pay the fine just like the people of that state.

Since we have some people doing "what if" junk, I will add a caveat. If some town put a law in place the was absurd and directly targeted out of area drivers, that you should be able to fight on the grounds it was unreasonable. It would have to be something like "All out of state driver must drive in reverse" type of garbage.

 

[Oak]

If you find a bomb attached to your car, if you disarm and remove it is it theft?

Is this hypothetical or is there a government agent intent on your fulfilling an agreement to drive around a very dense mass?

For any who didn't get the reference, the person to whom I was replying has the username BeowulfSchaeffer, which seems likely to be a reference to the (similarly spelled) Larry Niven character. Or it could actually be the poster's name, for all I know. Either way, my post was a joke in reference to the following (as summarized in the Wikipedia article -- *Plot spoiler warning for "Neutron Star"*):

In 2641, nearing the limit of his credit, Shaeffer is approached by a Pierson's Puppeteer, the Regional President of General Products on We Made It, with a proposal for work. In return for paying Shaeffer's debts and a half-million additional stars, Shaeffer would make a close fly-by of neutron star BVS-1 in an attempt to discover what had killed two humans, Peter and Sonya Laskin, who first attempted the fly-by. GP hulls were known to be effectively invulnerable, and the company was extremely interested in finding out what could get through them. Their interest was largely financial; they were concerned that the low insurance rates their hulls traditionally enjoyed would be increased. Shaeffer agreed to the mission, but planned to steal the ship. This plan was interrupted when an ARM agent, Sigmund Ausfaller, planted a bomb in the ship's lifesystem in order to ensure Shaeffer completed the mission, in order to maintain human-puppeteer relations. Shaeffer duplicated the Laskins’ experiment and determined they were killed by tidal effects during the close approach, effects that almost killed him as well. Returning to We Made It, Shaeffer learned that puppeteers seemed not to understand tides, implying that their world had no moon. He blackmailed the regional president of We Made It for one million stars.

 

[Chilly8]

That depends on the how the power is supplied. If it is supplied through the car battery, then it will be fused to the accessrory fuse, as it would be meant to turn on and off with the key.

Puilling that fuse would prevent the device from, and you could not be charged with a crime for pulling out a fuse.

A police tracker would not be connected to a car power source.

Another way he could have done it was to get a jammer that jams wireless Internet (1x,2g,3g,4g,5g,wifi,wimax).

An illegal cell phone jammer hardly seems an improvement on the legality scale...

If the jammer jams data, and not voice, it is not illegal.

It is only illegal to jam cellulular voice calls.

Jamming wireless Internet is not illegal, and there are jammers that can jam data, but not voice,.

I know this becuase in the 6 years I have lived in the apartement I have lived in, I have had neighbors in the past that have used such jammers,

I had one guy once living in the aparment next to me, who would jam data during family dinnertime to keep his children off his cell phone Internet, but voice calls would still work.

There was also another neighbor, on ankle bracelet, was using such a jammer to prevent the device from reporting his weheabouts, where, again, data was jammed, but voice was unaffected.

The apartment manager told me at the time they were not anything illegal by jammnig data. I was told by her that nothing could done unless and until the jamming started having problems with voice calls.'

In short, it is not illegal until voice calls start getting affected.

Your apartment manager is wrong, all of those jammers are illegal.

In the 6 years I have lived here, there have been people that have used such jammers, and HomeRiver, who was run this place for the past five of those, has told me there is nothing they can do about it, as long as as they are not interfering with cellular voice calls.

As far as HomeRiver is concerned, jamming data is not illegal, and not enough to evict someone. I have been pretty much told to take a long walk off a short pier. They have told me that they cannot do anything about someone who jams data, but not voice. As long as other tenants can make and receive telephone calls, tenants that jam data, are not breaking the law, in their view.

So HomeRiver is right, and you are wrong. Jamming data is not something they can evict someone for. I was told, a couple years ago, by them, that they cannot evict someone doing that until voice calls are affected, becuase it is not illegal, in their view, until voice calls are affected.