Legal Aspects
Fencing is illegal almost everywhere, usually under a similar rationale as in the United States, where receipt of stolen property is a crime in every state, as well as a federal crime if the property crossed a state line. Occasionally federal agents will temporarily set up a false fence sting operation. "Many organized crime members and associates are involved in the fencing of stolen property" (Pennsylvania Crime Commission, 1991). "The legal requirements for demonstrating that fencing has occurred are complex. In America, as in England, there are three elements to the crime: (1) The property must have been stolen; (2) the property must have been received or concealed (though the fence may not have actually seen or touched it); (3) the receiver must have accepted it with knowledge that it was stolen."
Pawnbrokers have often been associated with fencing, though in many jurisdictions, government identification must be shown in order to pawn an item and police regularly check pawnshops for stolen goods and repossess any stolen items. While pawnbrokers do not like this characterization of their business, police efforts have indicated that some pawnbrokers are involved in fencing. For example, in the US, the "Sarasota Police Department, Venice Police Department and North Port Police Department assisted with the undercover operation to sell gold jewelry to each business. Many were found to be in compliance. However, a number of businesses were operating under a "no questions asked" policy, making no attempt to properly document the seller information, record the items being purchased or obtain the seller's fingerprint, all of which are state requirements". Money laundering could be described as the "fencing of currency".
Read more about this topic: Fence (criminal)
Famous quotes containing the words legal and/or aspects:
“We should stop looking to law to provide the final answer.... Law cannot save us from ourselves.... We have to go out and try to accomplish our goals and resolve disagreements by doing what we think is right. That energy and resourcefulness, not millions of legal cubicles, is what was great about America. Let judgment and personal conviction be important again.”
—Philip K. Howard, U.S. lawyer. The Death of Common Sense: How Law Is Suffocating America, pp. 186-87, Random House (1994)
“Grammar is a tricky, inconsistent thing. Being the backbone of speech and writing, it should, we think, be eminently logical, make perfect sense, like the human skeleton. But, of course, the skeleton is arbitrary, too. Why twelve pairs of ribs rather than eleven or thirteen? Why thirty-two teeth? It has something to do with evolution and functionalism—but only sometimes, not always. So there are aspects of grammar that make good, logical sense, and others that do not.”
—John Simon (b. 1925)