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Stolen Property Law Sends Tough Message to Pawnbrokers
Kim Phelan
Contributing Editor
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| Finders-keepers will soon be a tougher game to pull off for Florida pawnbrokers who accept stolen property, a fair percentage of which floats from crooks who rent equipment and drive it straight to the pawnshop. Gov. Jeb Bush is expected to sign a bill this summer passed by both houses of the Florida state legislature at the end of April, creating a new criminal inference for dealing in stolen property. The state’s rental dealers see the statute as a step toward reducing the incidents of stolen equipment winding up in pawn, and as a healthy motivator for pawnshops to help return stolen goods to their rightful owners.
Grassroots efforts from rental store owners throughout the state played a vital role in keeping the bill alive, according to Deborah Lawson, lobbyist for the Florida Rental Association. Rental dealers rallied with strategically timed phone calls and e-mails to key legislators, including the speaker of the House, throughout the long and bumpy process. The bill was also bolstered by the active involvement and testimony from law enforcement officers, including detectives from the Florida Law Enforcement Property Recovery Unit, as well as from one of Florida’s most reputable pawn operations, Value Pawn.
Written in November of 2002, the bill met with numerous stalls, blocks and overall stiff opposition from the pawnbroker industry, Lawson recalls. Nevertheless, the bill was passed into law a year quicker than most pieces of legislation.
What’s disturbing about the bill, says Lawson, is the need for it at all.
“To me it seems absurd that you would have to put into law something that just makes common sense,” Lawson says. “But clearly because of the way the laws were written, there was a big loophole, and I think we’ve done a good job of closing it.”
Under the new law, pawnbrokers found in possession of stolen property “upon which a name and phone number of a person other than the offeror are conspicuously displayed,” and who have failed to make inquiries to determine whether the property is stolen, offer law enforcement an inference that the pawn dealer is dealing in stolen property.
Essentially, the impetus now rests on pawnbrokers to thoroughly check equipment for identifying marks, and to act on those findings by calling the person or company whose name is on the property. Failure to do so now means the pawnbroker can be charged with dealing in stolen property, a first or second-degree felony. Conviction could result in criminal penalties and could also cost them their license.
Until now, pawnbrokers in possession of stolen goods have found it relatively easy to explain away their guilt under provisions of the Pawnbrokers Act of the late 1980s, according to Lawson. She says she doesn’t believe any Florida pawnbroker has ever been charged with dealing in stolen property. All that’s been required is a denial of knowledge about the property’s origin, and, wham, case closed.
“It’s not that the cops or the state’s attorneys believe that the pawnbrokers didn’t know it was stolen,” says Lawson, “Rather, it’s too difficult of a burden of proof to meet. You have to jump through all kinds of hoops to do it, so nobody ever tries.”Dorsey Tennant knows about hoops. Law enforcement has indeed had a tough time shaking up dirty pawnshops, but rental dealers like Tennant, who runs Aldrich Tool Rental in West Palm Beach, have been washed, wrung and hung out to dry from the vein-popping outrage of having to buy back their own rental equipment that’s landed in the pawnbroker’s hands.
Florida’s former system has required property owners to file a writ of replevin (an action to recover property claimed to be unlawfully taken) against a pawnshop where their goods have been found. So rental dealers must endure three to six months of red tape, while their rental property sits idle and dusty in the back room of the pawnbroker.
But Tennant bucked the system. When his stolen air compressor was located in a pawnshop, the pawnbroker refused to relinquish the machine unless Tennant paid $130 to get it out of pawn. Instead, he filed a writ and decided to wait. But in the end, he was forced to cave in to the injustice of buying what was already his. His case was sent to mediation, where he was given two choices: Pay the pawnbroker 100 bucks or hire a lawyer to battle it out in court. He bit the bullet and paid the ransom.
Tennant’s only consolation is that he helped send the original crook to jail, but that too took a great deal of doing.
“The main thing with this new law is that it’s another step in the right direction,” Tennant says. “This isn’t a solve-all, but it’ll help. It’ll be harder for thieves to pawn our equipment. It’ll also force the pawn dealers to be more responsible and more diligent in looking the equipment over and making sure that it’s not stolen.”
If they don’t and they’re caught with it, they’re busted.
They’re also more likely to suffer consequences for holes left on the pawnbroker transaction forms, a requirement on every item they take in. The forms are submitted to law enforcement either by paper or electronically every 24 hours. However, says Lawson, pawnbrokers frequently leave blank a section asking if there are any unique markings or identification on the item. That habit is expected to change as understanding of the new law spreads.
While the new stolen property statute certainly equips law enforcement with sharper tools for recovering stolen goods and holding pawnshops accountable, the Florida Rental Association didn’t set out to take on the pawnbroker industry head on, says Lawson. The strategy was, rather, to strengthen stolen property laws and require responsible inquiries about property origin for anyone who regularly deals in used property.
“The thought behind this was not necessarily that we’re going to run around putting lots of pawnbrokers in jail,” she says. “We wanted to create a strong incentive for them to do the right thing and to notify people when they receive stolen property, or even better, not to accept stolen property. And if they accidentally take in something that’s stolen, we want them to have an incentive to say, ‘We’re sorry, we made a mistake,’ and give somebody back their property instead of using it as leverage to get money out of them.”
The entire bill, HB599 and SB1380, can be accessed online at www.leg.state.fl.us. |
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