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Forum -> Judaism -> Halachic Questions and Discussions

Lost and Found

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fleetwood

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 11:19 am

If you find something in a parking lot of a store is it stealing from the person if you keep it. Lets say you return it to the store for a store credit? Its not stealing from the store because theyre getting the item back. Is it stealing from the person who lost it if you have no way of knowing who it is?
Just curious.

red sea

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 11:31 am

Of course you should turn it in ! Otherwise you are either stealing from the store or the purchaser.

fleetwood

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 12:56 pm

But its not stealing from the store because they are getting back their stuff. It may be stealing from the buyer who lost it but returning it to the store wont help him???? He's long gone.

BennysMommy

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 12:58 pm

The person who lost it may return to the store and see if anyone turned it in. If I lost something between buying it and getting it home, I would definitely call the store.

BennysMommy

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 12:59 pm

I would prob call the store and say I found this and this in your parking lot. If someone asks about it please have them call me. Here is my phone number. Wait a few days and see what happens.

grin

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 1:00 pm

ASAIK, a brand new object from any store that is found in reshut harabim is hefker, since:
* it has no simanim - it's exactly like all the other similar objects from the store and
* the owner is assumed to have given up hope of recovering it, since it was lost in a place where many people pass (many of whom are non jews, besides).

greenfire

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 1:21 pm

why would you go to the store to get a refund - you didn't purchase the item ... was it in a bag, did it have a receipt, is there more than one store that shares the same parking lot ...

I got a camera that way ... What

only it was void of any identifying factors - I almost brought it to the police station until I realized one of them would get to keep the loot - so why not me ...

BennysMommy

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 1:23 pm

so what did u find?

red sea

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 1:31 pm

the person who lost it will go back to the store for it in all likelihood.

ok, so maybe there is no way that the store can lose if it was in the parking lot instead of inside the store but

you stole from the person

since it is very straightforward to turn in the item to customer service and they will get it from them.

Its not like you found an unidentified object on the nyc transit system, its rather easy to find the owner of the bag you found.

Idc if there is a loophole, if you bought yourself a picnic basket and accidentally forgot to take it out of underneath your wagon and load it in your car, its rather moral of a person to give it back instead of keeping it.

Ima2NYM_LTR

Mon, Jul 27 2009, 6:19 pm

This happened to DH. he was in a supermarket and found a palm pilot on the ground. What he decided to do is turn it in to the local police station, and then we posted signs at the store saying "if you lost it, go to the police station to get it" Now, DH believes it was originally stolen from some electronics store (display model) since it had sticky gunk on the back, like the stuff they use to stick the security chain to items...but we could not have known which store it was stolen from.
Bottom line, we did all we could to get it back to the legitimate owner. After 6 months it was not claimed, and we were told by the police that we could claim it after that time period. That is how we got our palm pilot. Free and clear and no moral ambiguities!

Merrymom

Tue, Jul 28 2009, 10:41 pm

This happened to me and I asked a Rav. The answer is that if alot of Jewish shoppers go there it is not considered hefker and you are obligated to try and find the owner or just don't touch it. You cannot take it.

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