is this legal!?

[tondaw2002]

i am at the detroit job corps center in detroit michigan. a student let me use a cell phone, he said it was his, the phone was actually stolen from the center before i got there. the center is saying i am responsible for the calls that i made. am i? what is the policy on receiving stolen property when you didn't know it was stolen in the state of michigan? (i am not a minor)

 

[JETX]

You cannot benefit from, or get ownership of, stolen property, even if you didn't know that it was stolen at the time. You are responsible for the calls that you made on the phone.

An example of this would be pawnbrokers... they pay money to an individual who decides to pawn an item. The pawn broker has no idea if the property was stolen or not. A few days later when the PD calls the broker about the stolen property, the pawn broker has to turn it over to the PD to be returned to the rightful owner. (I almost saw pawn brokers cry when we recovered property that they had paid out big bucks for!!!).