4 charged with stealing lead, copper wire from Amtrak lines

[benjibear]

http://lancasteronline.com/article/local/838266_4-charged-with-stealing-lead--copper-wire-from-Amtrak-lines.html

 

[leemell]

Yesssss! These guys should be nominated for stupid crook of the week. Amtrak Police found a baseball cap with a salvage yard receipt in at one of the crime scenes.

 

[SP&S]

Most of this activity could be eliminated by regulating scrap metal buyers as pawnborkers are. When there's no (or less of a) market for your stolen goods, there's no reason to steal them.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

Most of this activity could be eliminated by regulating scrap metal buyers as pawnborkers are. When there's no (or less of a) market for your stolen goods, there's no reason to steal them.

I have to agree. How can someone walk off the street with "about 40,000 pounds of copper and lead materials", and the scrap buyer not care/wonder where such came from?

 

[FriskyFL]

From where could these miscreants be obtaining this much metal from the system & not causing a problem?

If this material is indeed superfluous, perhaps Amtrak ought to be removing & scrapping it?

 

[A.J.]

I tangentially know someone (though I wish I didn't) who stole metal from a railroad (CP, I think) and his excuse was that the railroad, onto whose property he was trespassing, was just going to throw it away, so why shouldn't he pick it up? It makes me angry that people are this stupid and willfully disobedient of laws and simple morals. Sorry for the rant!

 

[benjibear]

The article stated comminications lines. In this area there are some old communication poles and wires that run parralle to the tracks. They look abondoned. Honestly for Amtrak $65,000 is not alot on money for amtrak. If they had a crew remove them, it would have taken time and probly cost them more.

I have been to two scrap yards in the last year and it seams they all work different. One took pictures of my scrap while it was on the scale and stored the images with a copy of my drivers license in a file. The other place, asked no questions. They should have because we had some things that could have been new or just wripped off.

 

[George Harris]

The article stated comminications lines. In this area there are some old communication poles and wires that run parralle to the tracks. They look abandoned. Honestly for Amtrak $65,000 is not alot on money for amtrak. If they had a crew remove them, it would have taken time and probably cost them more.

Maybe and maybe not. The railroad should have had some form of estimate of the scrap value of this material and what it would cost to remove it. Then there is also when the work can be scheduled. Next, the question is whether the material is usable elsewhere. Most railroad companies have carried reuse of materials to an art form. In this case, unless it is likely to deteriorate further it makes good sense to leave the stuff where it is until it is needed elsewhere.

Chances are the material would be worth more to the railroad even as scrap than it would be Joe Stickyfingers the thief, so the price that the thief got for the material is almost certainly less, and likely far less than the real scrap value of the material.