> So what these hoarders are doing is stealing the scooters -- rather than checking them out through the charger app, they're just grabbing them and tossing them in their van

This is not my understanding. The scooters I've seen throw an absolute fit if you move them more than ~1 meter without unlocking them via the app.

I don't know much about this, but I didn't think the scooters had to be returned to any particular place. So hoarders pick them up to charge them and when charged "return" them to their garage/backyard. In which case it's not as clearly theft, they are just returning them to an inconvenient place - but that's fine, they are dockless.