A lost-&-found laws story that bears repeating

Good input. Thanx for adding that.

Interesting indeed. It sets no value criteria for which "reasonable measures" is to be invoked. And instead seems to just cover ALL property. And it leave open to ambiguous interpretation what "reasonable measures" are. I mean, ... gee.... someone can abuse that easily.

For example: What if I think "reasonable measures" is to pin a note to any nearby telephone pole, saying "found ring. Call such & such ph. # to identify"
(knowing full well that the right person is not likely to see that paper pinned to a pole).

Does our ability to find a jeweler, who has microscopes capable of reading micro-engraving, constitute "reasonable measures" ? In the example of my friend , who failed to take any measure whatsoever, can't he just say "I didn't know there was such #'s on there" ?

When I researched CA's L&F laws years ago, it simply sets a value threshold. And just says to turn them in to the police. It does NOT give YOU AND I the latitude to make our own repatriation attempts (eg.: run a "found" ad on CL, or pin a note to a telephone pole, etc...). And the lawyer I talked to about this, said that there was good reason for this. Because otherwise, unscrupulous persons could make feeble efforts, that are meant to thwart finding an actual owner, for the intent of just keeping it.

I ran into this myself, when I ran a "found" ad once. A lady officer from the beach-side resort town I'd run the ad in, answered my ad. Asking if my item matched such & such description. Turns out, my item did not match the description. So I replied back "Sorry, not the right description". But this is where it got funky : She had apparently seen my reference to "found with metal detector". And she replied back a 3rd time and said ".... In the future, please bring anything you find to the police station. If the station is closed, there is a night-drop box slot on the door. In order to be in compliance with the law.... "

That last part (in bold italics) had me scratching my head. So I began to do research on the subject. And it was then, that I realized, that ... *technically*, ... we are all running afoul of this. I will be very careful about ever running a "found" ad again (at least in that city's CL , doh! )

I almost (but not quite) wish they'd define "reasonable"....but as you and I both know, if they DID do that, it would be very UNreasonable.


I would think (hope) that the courts would use the RPP standard. for example, you putting a CL ad in, or something in the local paper, would be considered "reasonable effort" by a reasonable, prudent person...of course there's no guarantee of that. They may consider it "reasonable" to put an ad in EVERY paper within 60 miles, for a period of a month, at your expense...or, if found at a popular ocean beach right after spring break, pu an ad in EVERY paper, nationwide, for 6 months.
 
Salt-shaker: As much as we all enjoy the good tear-jerker heart-warming re-union story , there has also been a few stories, circulated on md'ing forums, of reunions gone bad.

Yup, I have also heard of a few myself including a friend who tried to return a class ring and the same kind of thing happened. The guy tried to accuse him of stealing. Now he wont ever try to do a return.
So yes it can go both ways and fortunately its more rare but obviously you want to cover you butt so to speak and always be careful if thats the route you take
 
Yup, I have also heard of a few myself including a friend who tried to return a class ring and the same kind of thing happened. The guy tried to accuse him of stealing. ....

There was a guy here in CA who went to great lengths to track down a high-school class ring owner. Not an easy task, because as you know , people move away from their hometowns after they graduate, etc...

Eventually he tracked down the right person and their home ph . #. Apparently this ring had been lost a decade or more earlier. So the ring owner had, of course, long since forgotten about it. And now he's getting some total stranger, from a city 300 miles away, saying "Hi, I found your ring". The ring-owner cussed at him (thinking it was some sort of scam or sales call). But the md'r was persistent, and got him to understand that he had the guy's class ring .

Eventually the ring owner tells the md'r : "Mail it to me". The md'r says: "Fine, send me an SASE or send me some postage money." The ring owner says : "If you don't mail it to me, I'm going to call the cops". The md'r hung up disgusted. Not sure if the ring owner was really going to call the cops or not.
 
There was a guy here in CA who went to great lengths to track down a high-school class ring owner. Not an easy task, because as you know , people move away from their hometowns after they graduate, etc...

Eventually he tracked down the right person and their home ph . #. Apparently this ring had been lost a decade or more earlier. So the ring owner had, of course, long since forgotten about it. And now he's getting some total stranger, from a city 300 miles away, saying "Hi, I found your ring". The ring-owner cussed at him (thinking it was some sort of scam or sales call). But the md'r was persistent, and got him to understand that he had the guy's class ring .

Eventually the ring owner tells the md'r : "Mail it to me". The md'r says: "Fine, send me an SASE or send me some postage money." The ring owner says : "If you don't mail it to me, I'm going to call the cops". The md'r hung up disgusted. Not sure if the ring owner was really going to call the cops or not.

I work for a security firm so its easy to track people down. BUT these days people are much more paranoid for obvious reasons. Whether its scammers or not, you can never be too careful. Someone calling you out of the blue who you do not know but the other person knows you can be a little unnerving to say the least. Something just to take into account when returning something
 
I've had people stop and ask to see what I've found and I always say no. I always fear that once they see a ring even if it's just silver they might claim it as one they lost and ask for it. Then if they call the police they can give an exact description of it if I showed it to them.

I think I heard of a story like that happening too once.
 
I've had people stop and ask to see what I've found and I always say no. I always fear that once they see a ring even if it's just silver they might claim it as one they lost and ask for it. Then if they call the police they can give an exact description of it if I showed it to them.

I think I heard of a story like that happening too once.

When I'm asked what I've found I always tell them I only found "maybe a buck" in change and lots of pull tabs and other junk. They're welcome to the pull tabs :)
 
When I'm asked what I've found I always tell them I only found "maybe a buck" in change and lots of pull tabs and other junk. They're welcome to the pull tabs :)

Same here.."Pennies and pulltabs"...Just because a stranger asks me a question dont mean I have to give them an honest answer!:laughing:
 
.... Just because a stranger asks me a question dont mean I have to give them an honest answer!:laughing:

What ?? Huh ?? ON THE CONTRARY : It is your divine duty to tell us of all your finds. Or .... at the very minimum ... you must spin one of your creative writing wit tales. Now get to work and go find something cool to post about :cool:
 
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