Sherriffs lost Property of Arrestee

[davew128]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? CA

Close friend of mine was arrested last weekend. Went to the jail to pick her up after being bailed out, she immediately noticed that the keys to the rental car she had were not in her property bag (car wasn't impounded). She went right back to the front desk and the officer was less than helpful (being that it was 3am might have had something to do with it). The property inventory clearly indicates keys were with her when booked, and the arresting department insists they turned them over as well. Is there any recourse against the jail since they basically said too bad and lost property that will be expensive to replace? Rental agencies charge a lot to replace keys.

 

[justalayman]

so, did she sign a receipt stating she received what was on the inventory list, which included the keys?

 

[CdwJava]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? CA

Close friend of mine was arrested last weekend. Went to the jail to pick her up after being bailed out, she immediately noticed that the keys to the rental car she had were not in her property bag (car wasn't impounded). She went right back to the front desk and the officer was less than helpful (being that it was 3am might have had something to do with it). The property inventory clearly indicates keys were with her when booked, and the arresting department insists they turned them over as well. Is there any recourse against the jail since they basically said too bad and lost property that will be expensive to replace? Rental agencies charge a lot to replace keys.

Typically, you sign a property receipt when you are booked and when you leave. If she signed that she turned the keys over to the jail; when she entered jail and then signed it again when she was released indicating she received them back, she may be stuck.

Her first step is to make a claim for the loss with the Sheriff's office (or correctional agency) managing the jail. If they deny the claim (and they likely will deny it) then she may need to file a Small Claims Court action against the Sheriff's Department or the county for the costs associated with the lost keys. Depending on the county and the courts, she may get a chance to have the matter heard sometime in the next 6 months to a year.

 

[davew128]

Well theres a signed inventory form. What irritates me is that the arresting department had called me to confirm she was authorized to possess the keys, which she was, so I know the local department had them and she tells me she saw them when she was brought to the sheriff's facility. I agree she should have confirmed the keys before she left the building, but she literally walked out to where I was, got in, said the keys are missing, checked everything and walked right back inside. I witnessed it myself.

From my end (since they're MY keys or rather the car I was renting) I immediately filed a lost property report with the arresting department, and I guess I'll have to do it with the sheriff as well.

 

[CdwJava]

Well theres a signed inventory form. What irritates me is that the arresting department had called me to confirm she was authorized to possess the keys, which she was, so I know the local department had them and she tells me she saw them when she was brought to the sheriff's facility. I agree she should have confirmed the keys before she left the building, but she literally walked out to where I was, got in, said the keys are missing, checked everything and walked right back inside. I witnessed it myself.

From my end (since they're MY keys or rather the car I was renting) I immediately filed a lost property report with the arresting department, and I guess I'll have to do it with the sheriff as well.

All because the arresting department may have had them for a short time, that does not mean that they retained them - either by intent or by accident. The problem will be that if the keys were listed on her property inventory when she was booked into the jail, and she signed it, then the responsibility will fall back on her - and, the jail - not the arresting department. Even if the arresting officer stuffed them into a pocket and forgot about them, or lost them, the official record would show that the keys were with her at the jail and the responsibility gets passed on to the Sheriff as his people will be the ones saying that they received the keys. Of course, I doubt a jailer would put keys onto an inventory when they were not there at all ... how would he know to write the keys on the inventory if they were not there? So, it would seem that the keys had been at the jail when she arrived.

Could it be possible that the rental company retrieved them? This does occasionally occur in an arrest situation, though there should have been a record of this somewhere at the jail if so.

 

[justalayman]

I will say I have seen situations where the discharging officer refused to allow the arrestee to inventory the property bag prior to signing a receipt for the contents. I have seen incidents where the discharging officer strongly objected and attempted to dissuade the arrestee from actually inventorying the contents of the property bag prior to signing a receipt for the contents of the property bag. I have also seen where the contents of the property bag returned to the arrestee were not properly indicated on the inventory sheet. In fact, I know of a guard who was eventually arrested for stealing property from the property bags but it was not a single incident so it obviously proves that somewhere along the line, arrestees were signing for an inventory that did not truly represent what was in the property bags.

To say the officers are completely honest and there is no chance the keys were either lost or stolen by somebody within the jail system is being naive and somewhat ignorant to the world around them.

Now, that's not saying they were stolen, or even lost by anybody within the jail system but it surely puts a bit of doubt on their honesty and competence. Either the officer performing the original inventory was mistaken and there actually were no keys or the discharging officer was errant and the keys were not in fact within the property bag when it was returned or the arresstee subsequently misplaced the keys after being discharged or the arresstee is attempting to put the jail system in a bad light and intentionally making a false claim.

For some reason I suspect it is not due to anything on the arresstee's part here.

I did overlook the possibility Carl brought up about the rental agency retrieving the keys but since the car was not rented in the arresstees name, the actual renter did not file anything concerning a lost vehicle with the rental agency, and the car was not impounded, I suspect the rental agency did not retrieve the keys. There is no reason for them to without some indication from davew128 that there was an issue regarding their property.

and if they did retrieve them, it would surely be reflected on the property inventory that the keys were no longer in the property bag and why they were no longer in the property bag, at least if the agency was competent in their actions.

 

[CdwJava]

I never said that an error could not have been made. But, a theft of random keys would be a tad pointless, and thus, highly unlikely. And, the odds of a jailer making up a random description of keys and placing them on the inventory sheet when they were NOT present is ... uh ... well, it's just not likely to have occurred. So, it's almost certain that keys were there when she was booked. The question will be whether they were returned to her or not, and that will be an issue between the inmate and the jail. The arresting police department will likely be covered by presenting that inventory sheet to show that they did not have the keys.

Unless, of course, there is more than one set of keys and (a) the keys were improperly documented as "Keys" even if multiple sets, or, (b) there were two sets booked in and only one returned (or some permutation of these).

 

[justalayman]

knowing some of the correctional officers, cops, jailers, etc. I have known over the years, it would not surprise me if one of them simply took the keys to be an ass. Not saying it is what happened but I have no doubt it has happened sometime.

I think it will get down to:

was the arresstee given the opportunity to inventory the contents prior to leaving the jail

did the arresstee actually inventory the contents of the bag prior to leaving the jail


If affirmative to the first and negative to the second, I think it's a lost cause. If negative to the first, then it is obviously a negative to the second and there may be a possibility of a claim being honored or at least awarded if it goes further.

 

[davew128]

So far as I know, the only keys she had on her person were the rental car keys. Her house keys were still in the rental vehicle and she got them after I got a tow truck driver to unlock it when towing it back to the rental agency.

A friend of mine who used to work at that detention facility said its possible though unlikely the keys were put in someone else's inventory bag accidentally. I think if they were misbagged or anything else involving the sheriff's office, we might have gotten more cooperation had it been during normal business hours.

As for the rental agency retrieving the keys, not so far as I know. I called the next day and at least at the location I picked it up from they hadn't. She wasn't driving when she was arrested, the car was left where she had parked it, and there was no reason for it to be returned to the agency or held as evidence. As the renter, the arresting officer actually called me to confirm I had authorized her to have the keys, and presumably by extension the car.

 

[CdwJava]

Once again we are back to (1) she can make a claim against the Sheriff's office, and, (2) when they deny the claim, look into filing for actual damages in Small Claims court.

 

[davew128]

Pretty much what I figured. Thanks for the insight.