This is the most useful advice: call the police non-emergency number, explain concisely, and ask them what to do.
A bunch of the other suggestions, here on HN Streetwise ProTips, can get self and/or friends beaten, stabbed, and/or arrested.
A bunch of the other suggestions, here on HN Streetwise ProTips, can get self and/or friends beaten, stabbed, and/or arrested.
Not saying confronting thieves is for everyone. But it's not necessarily as physical as you think.
For the vast majority of people who live in reasonable cities, calling the police for something like that will get a timely response.
Many larger cities don't have the budget to provide adequate police coverage. So you get this sort of "best effort" response.
This is made worse with recent years of "defund the police" policies creeping into some of our larger cities.
It just reinforces the Pro 2A community's saying - when seconds matter, help is just minutes away.
Where I live the basic law/constitution establishes a protection duty of its citizens by the state (this includes their property). The police is one of the ways the state takes care of this duty. If the state is grossly negligent in this or even does nothing at all, the state may very well be on the hook to make the injured party whole. This responsibility is passed down and carried by individual police officers, and there have been cases of police officers being personally convicted of causing bodily harm for not dispatching a unit after a request for aid (despite them not personally swinging any punches)[1].
Generally you'll have police show up for near anything if they can.
[1] https://www.wz.de/panorama/nach-notruf-keine-streife-geschic...
During COVID, I called the non emergency line police for a break in on my car parked on the street and the police showed up in minutes then searched the area frantically to see if the guy was still around.
I don’t know if they are over funded or just bored.
If you talk to them in person, it should be to get an idea of what they'll do, which may or may not have something to do with what's legal.
If you want legal advice, ask a lawyer with experience in the relevant area.
Probably they will verify that the bike is yours, and retrieve it, or they will say that they don't have the resources.
Are people imagining that the police will say that you can go take the bike, but then turn around and arrest you for theft?
Of course, if the police tell you "finders keepers; it's in the Constitution", then you can seek legal advice.
Police don’t usually investigate petty crimes.
People are imagining the police will tell you that you can't steal it back, when legally you can.
After all, it's the police's job to keep the peace. And things are more peaceful if I'm not busting up thieves' hideouts all guns blazing like Rambo.
Entrapment is reserved for the police going above and beyond, eg "sell me meth or I'll kill your dog" where it can be argued that the entrapped normally would not do the crime.
I still wouldn’t be very excited to try this defense in court.
No, this is about on duty police in uniform saying it's okay.
Working with that suspicion, especially given that this is HN, police saying "don't go steal it back" might still be very good advice, regardless of legal right.
For example (referring back to a scenario earlier in thread), I'm imagining a techbro crew, all jumping into one of their Teslas, and rolling up on misguided urban youth turf.
There's already a lot of misunderstanding and animosity, both ways, between stereotypes. And someone's attempt at "show of force" just escalated it. So, who will escalate the stupid further, and stab or draw a gun first.
"We cannot answer legal questions, please seek a lawyer for advise."
I don't do anything terribly interesting, so this was almost certainly not an issue actually worth paying $200 for a lawyer to answer.
the police will give you any advice, good or bad. They're not legally responsible for anything they said to you, as long as they're not telling you to commit a crime (in which case, if they did they will deny it).
You can still call 'em up of course - but don't 100% just trust their words blindly.
It's great that you think _someone will handle that for you_ but it is probably a fantasy. Unfortunately you will probably need to self resolve. If you think it is going to escalate to violence, bring overwhelming force.