police lost property scam....beware

kreid

1) I don't particularly want the police to benefit from my honesty!
2) If you find an item and it isn't claimed, you have the right as finder to claim it after a certain period.
3) This right is being removed under a spuripous guise.....the card could easily be removed by the police themselves.
4) if the phone can't be returned to the finder because of data, it can't be auctioned or offloaded to "someone in the industry" either. There is something amiss here...don't you think....? Moreover, it will lead to people just not handing in items end of story.

If you are the smartest man alive you wouldn't have lost your phone in the 1st place!;)
You may well have had an item lost. If it was handed in but you didn't/ couldn't claim it, then it probably DID go back to the finder, and rightly so.

Bamber19

fair point... but it's nothing to do with the data protection act, you've just taken the title of the act and assumed the content.

uktim29

The data protection act must also have something to do with privacy in it as well which is where this might have some relevance. I recently read in Computer Active I think about business's that set up cctv systems should inform some data protection body under the data protection act. I don't have the magazine now so can't see exactly what it was refering to.

superscaper

uktim29 wrote: »

The data protection act must also have something to do with privacy in it as well which is where this might have some relevance. I recently read in Computer Active I think about business's that set up cctv systems should inform some data protection body under the data protection act. I don't have the magazine now so can't see exactly what it was refering to.

Ordinarily I'd agree, personal photos for example do come under the data protection act. But in this case there's a double standard if they won't release the camera to the finder under that justification yet they'll put it into a police auction without a second thought to tha DPA without even checking the camera (not just speculation, I had a look at some of the police auctions for digital cameras).

kreid

mmh, the plot thickens and i smell a rat.I am going to check this out monday.Will post back!

arnie&caseysma!

Some cameras not only have a removeable memory card but also an internal memory, I know mine does. It may be that this is a local policy that they do not return such unclaimed items to the finder incase there are certains types of picture on the internal memory that can be used by a person for any purpose (pornographic, those of children that can be distorted and posted on internet, external and internal pics of houses that could be just lovely to burgle, etc etc etc). I am not saying that you would do this but should they take the chance?
The police cannot check the memory to see what there is on it before returning to a person and in all likelihood it would be sent for destruction rather than to a police auction.

kreid

why can't they check? c an't be that hard?

stugib

arnie&caseysma! wrote: »

Some cameras not only have a removeable memory card but also an internal memory.....the police cannot check the memory to see what there is on it before returning to a person

I was going to make the same point, it seems a complete waste of police time to be learning how different cameras or phones work to delete any content.

superscaper

arnie&caseysma! wrote: »

The police cannot check the memory to see what there is on it before returning to a person and in all likelihood it would be sent for destruction rather than to a police auction.

Doesn't seem to be the case though. As I mentioned before, they actually are sold off in police auctions (I checked the bumblebee site and even found one that included the memory card with it and it remained unchecked).

Hapless_2

kreid wrote: »

1) I don't particularly want the police to benefit from my honesty!
2) If you find an item and it isn't claimed, you have the right as finder to claim it after a certain period.

Is this right enshrined in law?

The usual police practice is that the finder can have the goods back and keep them if they are not claimed within six weeks.

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/your_world/consumer_affairs/keeping_lost_found_and_uncollected_goods.htm#Lost_goods


I don't think there is any "right" for anyone to be able to claim property they have found. Unless you have the law to quote.

Finders, keepers


Find a penny,Pick it up,And all day,You'll have a penny. -- AnonYou could also have, in principle, a prosecution for theft, contrary to Section 1(1) of the Theft Act (1968). Of course, you won't really be prosecuted, but it remains theoretically the case that this action could constitute theft.
In fact, the issue whether or not a person is entitled to keep things found laying around raises some extremely complex, and technical, points of law. Even now, nearly 40 years after the Theft Act was supposed to simplify and stabilise the whole law of theft, the simple issue of finding a penny raises questions that have no straightforward answers.
This article discusses some of the reasons for thinking that picking up a penny in the street may, or may not, amount to theft. Using a penny as an example reinforces the notion that, theoretically, the scale of the alleged theft is of no importance to the decision whether you are guilty or innocent.

Let's start with what `theft' is, or at least what UK statute law says it is. From s.1 of the 1968 Act we find:

``A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it''

Sounds simple enough? Well, no, actually. Let's start with what `dishonestly' means.
Dishonesty

You've probably got a fair idea of what `dishonesty' is; most people have. You may think that your idea of dishonesty is not all that different from most other peoples'. In the majority of cases, this will probably be true. If you asked 100 people whether it was dishonest to take money out of another person's pocket, probably 99 people would say `yes'. The one person who would say `no' or `maybe' would be either be a habitual crook or a lawyer (see later for why). But there are cases, and these are the ones that end up in the Court of Appeal, where the issue is not clear cut at all. Let's see what the Theft Act has to say about dishonesty. In fact, it doesn't attempt to define dishonesty at all, but simply gives (in s.2) examples of behaviour that is not to be regarded as dishonest. A person is not dishonest if he:

``(a)...appropriates the property in the belief that he has in law the right to deprive the other of it;''

or

``(b)...appropriates the property in the belief that he would have the other's consent if the other knew of the appropriation and the circumstances of it;''

http://www.kevinboone.com/findapenny.html

I don't think their is any "right" to keep lost property, even if it has been handed in. Would you give your consent to someone keeping your camera or whatever if you lost it and they had found it?
Or do you think that by someone not going to the police station that you handed something into to see if it was there constitutes consent?