Could be a sad day for detecting in australia

[Heatho]

The forums should have never handed the peoples info over to the police in the first place,

I still think the finders were wrong for taking it home, what if their kids had found it and it had gone off, Doesn't bare thinking about when you consider how it could of ended.

Totally insane for taking the grenade home, they are lucky that they weren't killed by such an old and potentially unstable explosive.

 

[AtomRat]

Thats very similar to the VIC laws as well Heatho

 

[Wally69]

direct evidence showing the degrading calibre of newspaper headlines, surely it should have read .... BOOM BABY !!!

 

[magneticsand]

The forums should have never handed the peoples info over to the police in the first place,

Years back I had a mate at my house for a couple of days. His brother is a floor sander, he was project managing part of a Reno for me.
He logged into a forum he uses. No posts. Just a login.

About two years ago, cops show up at my house, misidentify themselves, lie about why they are there and investigate me.
(I'm omitting 95%) of the story. But its understandable looking back.

Police from three countries involved over a period of something like 8 months over some stupid ***** he said online, high profile though, so they had to follow every possible lead.

The police will always get your data if they want/need it.

 

[B5MECH]

Love a good pineapple
Old man came back from Nam with a stack of them, peeved off that that him and his mate didn't defuse one for me to keep
Ended up going on a fishing expedition with them :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[the duck]

https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/v...nade-in-chidlow-taken-home-as-souvenir/#page1

 

[Goldpick]

I couldn't find anything about this on AMDRH, I don't doubt it at all Duck, anyway will just have to keep an eye out for any news on the subject.

Anyway here's a good link that mentions a bit about theft by finding, you don't have to hand stuff in to the police but should for anything quite valuable. If a large sum of say cash or gold bullion is found you would be mad not to hand it in.

"In New South Wales it is punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment, home detention, community service and good behaviour bonds. Offenders may also have to make reparations to the victim.

For theft by finding to be proved, the prosecution must negate the following:

the goods were abandoned;
and that the accused did not believe that the owner could be found.

If the person accused of the crime honestly believed that the property was abandoned or that the owner cannot be found, they are not guilty."

http://www.sydneycriminallawyers.co...d-you-do-if-you-find-a-large-amount-of-money/

I found the topic and had a read through, the member did have everything confiscated, I'm guessing as evidence. Guess we will wait to see how things play out in court, though I think there was a bit naivetivity on the whole subject on where/how to dispose of detected munitions. Bit of a lesson to just leave any munitions in situ, and report them to police rather than taking such items home.

With regards to finding and posting jewellery pics, I'll leave that up to member's discretion on whether they continue to post pics, or indicate in their post that reasonable efforts were taken on returning the items to their owners (if possible in the first place). Obviously a grey areas exists on whether an item was abandoned or recently lost, pretty hard to for the authorities or detectorist to prove that a ring was found as a recent drop, or had been sitting in the soil/sand for a substantial period. Also have to take into account whether the original owner had already claimed under insurance, and is trying to double dip by also claiming the lost item as well (ie. Fraud).

For the record, the member in question has done jewellery recoveries in the past, so hopefully that will work in his favour.

Safest bet is just to hand any detected valuables to the police, then at least you have a record of the transaction, and then re-claim the items if no owners come forward after a few months.

 

[Wally69]

it could have been the start of the next big WA MiNE-lab-ING BOOM