Support NeoGAF

[Pandaman]

does anyone have any experience doing this?

my fucko roommate got into one argument too many with his girlfriend, cops were called and whoops turns out the terms of his parole stated he had to be living in another city, they pick him up and he goes away for hopefully a long time.

anyway, first chance i get i talk to the now ex-gf about getting some of my stuff back, turns out the asshat pawned off my ps3 and maybe a number of games [she doesnt know where they are], she knows which shop its at though. he still has the ticket, but shes going to ask him for it when she visits him at the jail.

so yeah... i didnt write down the serial number, but the girlfriend is a witness to the fact it was my ps3 and it was purchased and registered through the source under my name, if she gets the ticket or not, i should be able to have the police confiscate the system while pursuing charges right? anyone know how long that might take before its returned to me? the guy who did it is broke as fuck and a complete drunk anyway, so he wont be able to give me the money for it [and i have no idea if its set to go on the shelves or not].

what should i do? take the hit and buy it back? if i talk to the pawn shop might i be able to buy it back for the money he got for it? if i do buy it back, can i still pursue charges? i've googled around, but alot of the law I'm finding is u.s. related.

oh and as icing, the girlfriend moves out on monday and neither of them paid the cable bill for the 120gig plan i was the only one against getting because we couldn't trust everyone to stay around in a no contract low income house/apartment.

 

[Boomba]

Report it stolen? Report a theft?

 

[InfiniteNine]

Do you have the PS3's MAC address on your router or something? It is possible to ID it with that.

 

[weekend_warrior]

Call the cops bro.

edit: Just read your post. You loaned the PS3 to your friend and he pawned it off? You're boned. Take the hit and move on.

 

[Pandaman]

Do you have the PS3's MAC address on your router or something? It is possible to ID it with that.

i can only find a list of current connections.

would the source have a record of the serial number on individual units, since it was registered in my name?

 

[MWS Natural]

http://www.buy.com/prod/playstation-3-system-120gb/q/sellerid/25493968/loc/108/211914871.html

 

[Pandaman]

Call the cops bro.

edit: Just read your post. You loaned the PS3 to your friend and he pawned it off? You're boned. Take the hit and move on.

i didnt loan it, he was my roommate. as far as i was aware, it had never left the house.
he has the only tv in the house, so it was in his room most of the time. he apparently pawned it just before christmas and locked his door when he left [while i wasn't home, he was supposed to leave it unlocked so i could get in and use it]. when he got back last week i asked him about it and he was waffling, so i was getting suspicious.

 

[InfiniteNine]

i can only find a list of current connections.

would the source have a record of the serial number on individual units, since it was registered in my name?

If you have it registered with Sony you can try calling to get it or if you have your receipt for the PS3 it should have it printed on there, no?. Not sure if Sony would give it to you if you asked though but they should at least have it on file if you registered.

 

[weekend_warrior]

i didnt loan it, he was my roommate. as far as i was aware, it had never left the house.
he has the only tv in the house, so it was in his room most of the time. he apparently pawned it just before christmas and locked his door when he left [while i wasn't home, he was supposed to leave it unlocked so i could get in and use it]. when he got back last week i asked him about it and he was waffling, so i was getting suspicious.

Tough call. The problem is that the PS3 was never reported stolen, so I don't know if the pawn shop would be held liable for buying "stolen" goods.

You could try calling the cops, but I think you're boned.

 

[Pandaman]

If you have it registered with Sony you can try calling to get it or if you have your receipt for the PS3 it should have it printed on there, no?. Not sure if Sony would give it to you if you asked though but they should at least have it on file if you registered.

its registered with the store that sold it, not sony. currently digging for the receipt.

 

[rj118]

Legally you're not allowed to get it back once the pawn shop sells it to someone else. You could take the pawn shop to court (or even threaten to do so and they might just give you the console back to avoid the cost depending on the size of the store) provided you can prove that the system was yours. I hope that helps!

 

[Pandaman]

Tough call. The problem is that the PS3 was never reported stolen, so I don't know if the pawn shop would be held liable for buying "stolen" goods.

You could try calling the cops, but I think you're boned.

they'd only be liable if they bought something stolen without getting proper id from the buyer, they're pretty protected.

i think what would happen is they would have to go after the seller to get their money back and the system would be returned to me once the police are done with it as evidence.

 

[Pandaman]

Legally you're not allowed to get it back once the pawn shop sells it to someone else. You could take the pawn shop to court (or even threaten to do so and they might just give you the console back to avoid the cost depending on the size of the store) provided you can prove that the system was yours. I hope that helps!

they are still holding it [as i understand]

but yeah, im going to stop by there first since its on the way to the station.

 

[InfiniteNine]

Yeah, it's only been about a couple of weeks so it should still be there since most places hold it for at least a month before selling. If you can get the serial number with your name tied to it you should be able to get it back after reporting it. Good luck man.

 

[Repgnar]

Legally you're not allowed to get it back once the pawn shop sells it to someone else. You could take the pawn shop to court (or even threaten to do so and they might just give you the console back to avoid the cost depending on the size of the store) provided you can prove that the system was yours. I hope that helps!

Why would he be able to bring the Pawn shop to court? I'm not familiar with the laws but wouldn't his friend be at fault instead of the shop?

 

[Seth C]

Just file a police report and they will help you recover your property.

 

[rj118]

Why would he be able to bring the Pawn shop to court? I'm not familiar with the laws but wouldn't his friend be at fault instead of the shop?

The pawn shop has (bad) title to the item in question, so even though the friend is at fault for selling something that he didn't own the pawn shop would be more ideal to take action against. This isn't really a matter where the courts need to get involved but it is always an option.

 

[LocoMrPollock]

Same shit happened to me and I never got my stuff back.

It's so infuriating because I actually had the pawn slip and was willing to pay for my shit, that had been stolen, but they wouldn't give it to me. I got so heated, that it escalated to the police being called (by them) and of course I still didn't get my stuff returned.

 

[Rorschach]

Just file a police report and they will help you recover your property.

Yep. Pawn shops take the loss when it comes to buying stolen goods. They might have beef with your roomie, though!

 

[Pandaman]

Same shit happened to me and I never got my stuff back.

It's so infuriating because I actually had the pawn slip and was willing to pay for my shit, that had been stolen, but they wouldn't give it to me. I got so heated, that it escalated to the police being called (by them) and of course I still didn't get my stuff returned.

wait, seriously? they wont give it if you have the slip but aren't the seller?

shit.

 

[LocoMrPollock]

wait, seriously? they wont give it if you have the slip but aren't the seller?

shit.

Not the pawn shop that I had to deal with, they required picture ID, and like your situation, the idiot that had stolen from me was in jail at the time.

 

[Pandaman]

Not the pawn shop that I had to deal with, they required picture ID, and like your situation, the idiot that had stolen from me was in jail at the time.

was it jewelery or something hard to identify as being exclusively yours?

where do these fuckos get off. its bad enough he was leeching off me, but who the fuck robs someone doing you a favour.

you'd think there'd be someway the police could represent someone in jail for these sort of things.

 

[LocoMrPollock]

was it jewelery or something hard to identify as being exclusively yours

It was my old SNES games collection. Many RPGS (Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, FF2, FF3) in mint condition, worth a few hundred dollars on eBay, and then just some other random stuff, movies and cds, my Xbox and PS2 and games. The SNES collection hurt the worst, though, especially since they only gave him like $25 for the complete collection. I'm gonna get all riled up about it again.

But yeah, pawn shop said it was against the law for them to give the stuff to me, even though I was willing to pay off the loan. Police said the same thing and said there was nothing they could do, since they would have had to witness the theft firsthand.

It's very hard to prove something is yours, harder still to prove that it was stolen and pawned without your permission, it's basically your word against theirs, unless you have some kind of documentation stating that you own it, like a car title.

 

[GillianSeed79]

Report it stolen. Pawn shops have to keep goods for a certain number of days before selling it. Once you report it stolen, the cops can recover it.