Lisa Pelosi: Yes, definitely. We have people who are arrested for cases where perhaps somebody’s not a citizen of the United States and someone says, “If you don’t pay me a certain amount of money, I’m going to expose that you’re not a citizen and that you’re illegally in the country”, and the society cannot function in that way and often times, people are arrested for those types of crimes.
Theft of Lost Property Often Refers to Hot Products or Stolen Property
Interviewer: When they refer to theft of lost property, is that something along the lines of something that belongs to someone else but would that refer to like hot products too, like stolen property as well?
Lisa Pelosi: Yes. I think that that would come under that, fall under that term. Often times, people who have stolen items, their next line of attack would be to try to sell the items and then, sometimes, I have clients come to me who purchased items and they’re charged with possession of stolen property and they say, “I had no idea that this item was stolen”. I think a good indicator is for people to keep in mind is if the deal seems like it’s too good, probably they shouldn’t engage in purchasing something because if the deal is too good, it’s probably not a good deal.
People Often Purchase Hot Products Because They Are a Lot Cheaper
Unfortunately, many people look the other way in those circumstances and then, they’re arrested for criminal possession of stolen property and the defense of, “I didn’t know it was stolen”, is usually what’s puts force and the prosecutor would try to look at all the facts and circumstances surrounding the individual getting a hold of the property. So, for example, if someone is on a highway and they flag you down and ask you if you want to buy a diamond watch for $100, you know the odds are it’s stolen property and the prosecutor’s going to use the facts and circumstances of you obtaining the property against you to show that in fact, you were aware that you were possessing stolen property. So, people have to be careful. As you mentioned, with cell phones, it’s so easy for a prosecutor to show that people possessed stolen property by looking at the facts and circumstances surrounding and getting the property.
Theft of Services Often Refers to Minor Occurrences Such as Jumping a Turnstile on the Subway or Non Payment of Cab Fare
Interviewer: Theft of services, that would refer to something along the lines like stealing someone’s services like maybe a cab driver or something like that; is that something that’s common?
Lisa Pelosi: Often times, people are charged with theft of services where it could be something as small as jumping a turnstile on the subway or it can be from you’re in a cab, the taxicab and you, just at your destination, get out and runaway and you’ve taken the services and not paid for the services. Sometimes, with people stopped in the cabs; sometimes there’s a dispute between the cab driver and the person riding in the cab and the police are called and the cab driver is yelling that they didn’t pay but the person who’s in the car is trying to say, “He didn’t take me where I was supposed to go”, or, “He took the long way and so, I’m not paying it”, so that would be an example of theft of services.
