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Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

justice.gov

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Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#71

Post by nicd »

Nullabillity wrote: post #40
TEP_Kim_Il_Sung wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people seem to use "killing" and "murder" interchangably, though they are different in more than legal ways. A building collapsing can kill a person, as can a landslide, and an uncontrollably skidding car. A lion attacking a human and eating his organs is no murderer, and neither is that human for defending themselves by killing that lion before he can finish his attack. One human killing another does not ne…

GGP is talking about intentionally killing people. That's murder. Please consider applying the correct word to the context you wish to discuss.

I think parent was referring to the definition of murder being "the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another." Killing someone under lawful circumstances (such as self defense) is not murder, under this definition.

Getting pretty deep in the semantic weeds here though, and I feel obliged to say I have no horse in this race either way. Don't kill or murder me :)

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#72

Post by xcrunner529 »

reustle wrote: post #38
oblib wrote: post #29

I think taking down the buyers is a the best tool we have right now for this issue. And there are things we could do to make that easier, like putting a serial number on the converter on new cars and replacement parts. Requiring the make, model, and serial number of the car it was removed from, and a web site with a DB that has the ID number of cars they've been stolen from so buyers could check it. Make those who bu…

People would grind off the serial numbers and sell them on the secondary market, or for the metals. With motorcycles, for example, motors and frames have vin numbers stamped to help prevent this, but you’ll sometimes see cheap parts for sale with the vin cleaned off.

Why can’t it be a felony to buy said items?

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#73

Post by rdtwo »

castratikron wrote: post #51
tomohawk wrote: post #35

1: why do we need obsolete tech like catalytic converters when there is better tech for ICE to accomplish the same thing? (answer: because the government requires catalytic converters regardless, so no motivation to replace) 2: why did it take them this long?

What's the alternative?

People stealing car batteries at 7-12k a pop

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#74

Post by denkmoon »

treeman79 wrote: post #6
NaturalPhallacy wrote: post #3

It's kinda fascinating to watch mining for precious metals go from digging tunnels, to extracting from other people's cars. I wonder if this will make a dent in how often it happens. My niece's was stolen in broad daylight.

Only thing that will help is serious prison sentences and the right to defend property with deadly force. Many areas of the country there is no consequences.

My country has neither of those and the stealing of catalytic converters is very uncommon.

Please go right ahead though, seeing the failures of the punitive system in the US provides an exemplar of why my country should not go down that path.

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#75

Post by danielvf »

55555 wrote: post #28

I may be misreading this but the margins look insane. DG Auto paid like 38 million USD for stolen converters, performed a simple extraction process, then sold the precious metals for 550 million USD. Wow.

You are missreading it. :)

That's one group of thieves selling 38 million worth to them. Later on in the document more groups of thieves are listed, getting paid 13, 45, and 6 million dollars. But that's still not necessarily the whole amount paid to thieves.

Also, it's quite possible that some of their business, and thus sales to refineries was legitimate. None of their partners are listed in the press release as being arrested.

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#76

Post by MichaelZuo »

cratermoon wrote: post #39
sokoloff wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you give a dog timely and consistent corrections, it really does learn. That's literally half the battle in house-training a dog. (Yes, you try to control and arrange success and praise when the dog does the right thing, but you also correct when it does the wrong thing.)

Dogs are smarter than people.

Pretty odd location to write a joke.

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#78

Post by notriddle »

laverya wrote: post #23
genmud wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that if you paid for your home with criminal activity you should forfeit that to repay the victims of your crimes. If your legal and illegal stuff is together, tough shit.

Right, but they should have to prove that the home was paid for with crime, and not the other way around.

That seems like an impossible standard. What happens if the criminal took a job that payed less because of their criminal activity, put the legal paychecks into house payments, and the illegal money into food and other consumables?

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#79

Post by NaturalPhallacy »

nkrisc wrote: post #18
treeman79 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only thing that will help is serious prison sentences and the right to defend property with deadly force. Many areas of the country there is no consequences.

Property is not worth a life. Not even the life of the person damaging it. Property can be replaced, a life can not. Besides, there’s way too much margin for error in vigilante justice. That’s why we have trials, imperfect as even they may be. They’re certainly better than empowering everyone to be judge, jury, and executioner because they thought you might be committing a property crime.

>Property is not worth a life.

Generally speaking, no, of course not. But, if someone's breaking into your home in the middle of the night, you don't know what their intentions are to just steal some stuff or to rape and murder your family. There's a reason so many states have castle doctrine and such, and it's because there really are bad people out there.

Re: Justice Department announces takedown of catalytic converter theft ring

#80

Post by plorg »

TEP_Kim_Il_Sung wrote: post #32
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do we get from catalytic converters to the right to murder so quickly?

A lot of people seem to use "killing" and "murder" interchangably, though they are different in more than legal ways. A building collapsing can kill a person, as can a landslide, and an uncontrollably skidding car. A lion attacking a human and eating his organs is no murderer, and neither is that human for defending themselves by killing that lion before he can finish his attack. One human killing another does not ne…

You are not responding to the previous comment. If you want to say that you think killing someone because they took or damaged your things is justified, say that. GGP was clearly saying that doing so is murder (in my reading: normatively if not in the eyes of the law), so respond to that.
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