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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;cplradar, post: 7961263, member: 108985&quot;]We did not know until weeks after the burglary.&nbsp; As for the facts, we had, as you are likely aware, detailed images of all the coins, receipts and a spread sheet with all the details.&nbsp; What we didn&#039;t have was a cooperative police department willing to make a detailed police report of the lose or even a decent investigation.&nbsp; We did not have cooperation with auction houses and TPGers who refuse cooperation.&nbsp; We have a system that encourages theft.&nbsp; Coins, even raw coins, can be identified.&nbsp; Dealers and pawnshops can be held responsible.&nbsp; It happens in other industries, and it happens when insurance companies get involved.</p><p><br /></p><p>The first step, of course, it to get dealers and auction houses on board to take due diligence with every coin that is handled and to make substantial civil penalties for being caught with stolen property.&nbsp; Right now the system supports criminal activity.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>No, what we have is not even a fraction of what exists in the fine arts community, and not even as protected as bicycles.&nbsp; Bicycles, for example, can get registration numbers and can be registered with the police department.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>That is a failure of understanding crime, especially in urban environments.&nbsp; You have coins in your house and coins in the house with windows locked when you leave.&nbsp; You can even have them in a safe.&nbsp; There is no end to protection one can have, and it will be defeated by thieves.&nbsp; You can&#039;t stop crime by having physical protection.&nbsp; Banks can&#039;t do it and people can do it even less.&nbsp; Crime only comes under control when the law is enforced, and the risks of getting caught rise and that can only be accomplished with cooperation of dealers, auction houses and third party graders.</p><ol> <li>I can take a picture of a coin now, today, and I can identify that coin, without a slab, with nearly 97% of less that a tenth of a standard deviation, forever.&nbsp; There are identifying features on individual coins and imperfections or even micro hair lines, that can fingerprint that coin.&nbsp; Coins can be slabbed and locked out of the market until an owner unlocks the coin.&nbsp; That is ONE way to greatly reduce the market for stolen coins.</li> <li>We can change the law to end sunset provisions for pawn shops and end the safe harbor they have with regard to collectables and artifacts</li> <li>We can have an international database for all stolen items that are shared by all dealers and TPGs.</li> <li>We have register all coin dealers and have them take fraud and abuse training like they have for every health provider in the US.</li> <li>We can end all anonymous sales, which is something the art world has been fighting for against Christies for decades.&nbsp; Much progress is made on this as auction houses have to keep better records that previously, but not enough to protect the small time collector.</li> <li>We can devise affordable safes for coin collectors with GPS system and Bio-metrics. <br /> </li> <li>We can take several actions to encourage and make it easier for all coin thefts to be reported so we can get accurate figures of the problem.&nbsp; <br /> </li> <li>We can promote changes in the law and within police departments to take these cases more seriously.</li> <li>We can have mandatory reporting requirments for suspected stolen property for coin dealers.&nbsp; It should not be enough to just turn them away.&nbsp; You need to report them as well.<br /> </li> <li>The end of cash purchases of coins for more than $500, which is the law in Europe.</li> </ol><p>That is just some ideas off the bat.&nbsp; The one thing Coin Talk can do is create an environment that encourages all this, starting with a section for people to report all coin thefts, even small ones that generally never get reported to the police.&nbsp; It should be a moderated section and all the entries should have a the following:</p><p><br /></p><ul> <li>description of the lost coins, with <br /> </li> <li>images if possible, <br /> </li> <li>contact information for the person who stole the coins,</li> <li>contact for the police department that is investigating the theft</li> <li>Serial Numbers of the Slabs</li> <li>Time and Date the Theft was discovered</li> <li>approximate value of the stolen coins</li> <li>Receipt of the purchase of the coins</li> <li>The reporting agent</li> </ul><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>Of course you can.</b>&nbsp; And they are guilty.&nbsp; It can never be what you just said.&nbsp; Business ethics collapse if they are, &quot;I will do everything I can that is allowed to me under the law, and skirt ethics at every turn to turn a profit, and use a battery of lawyers to defend myself&quot;&nbsp;&nbsp; The law can never cover all instances of due diligence and morality when it comes to business practices.&nbsp; Businesses have compliance and business ethics, and even mission statements, and these are not defined in the law and it can never be.&nbsp; Corporate culture is part and parcel of business operations.&nbsp; The law will always be a step behind the latest abuses within a market.&nbsp; Ethics are the responsibility of the auction houses, and the dealers.&nbsp; Who else are you going to depend on?&nbsp; The criminals?</p><p><br /></p><p>The cry, &quot;I did nothing illegal&quot; is simply not enough (as well as it is usually not true).&nbsp; You have to do what is right by a reasonable code of ethics and protect your clients, yourself and society at large.&nbsp; The minute you forget this, we are in trouble.... like Enron trouble.</p><p><br /></p><p>Remember the Ford Pinto.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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