Re: Who owns stuff that falls onto someone's property?

[Tim May]

On Sunday, February 2, 2003, at 05:32  AM, Ken Hirsch wrote:

I don't think there are any difficult legal issues involved. If you drop your
wallet on someone's property, it is still your wallet. If you crash your car onto
somebody's front yard, it's still your car (for better or worse). If a plane
crashes carrying U.S. mail, the Post Office gathers up whatever mail it can find and
tries to deliver it. Would you have it any other way?

But if I go outside and find an object in my yard, it is not a felony to touch it. And, in fact, I have no special obligation to not touch it, not take it in my house, etc.

To have it otherwise would mean every time I find an unexpected item in my yard or on my property in general I am not allowed to touch it.

Even if ownership was in question, does anybody really think it's a good idea to
sell the pieces of evidence while the accident investigation is going on?

This wasn't the issue.

--Tim May
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Nietzsche