Feds Seize Gold Coins Worth $80 Mln From Pennsylvania Family

Originally posted by superman2012

Originally posted by dragonridr

Originally posted by BABYBULL24
Its a joke - a sad joke!

What are the Feds going to confiscate every bottle of 1933 Domaines Barons de Rothschild Chateau Lafite Rothschild wine bottle cause Prohibition was going on at the time?

Really sad we put up with this bull#!

Peace

The reason they confiscated it is it was stolen from the US mint.They never belonged to the family they were stolen property.Why is it no one ever takes the time to get the whole story.Property stolen from the US mint will all ways be returned to it no mater how long its been it is US property. Its like if someone stole the constitution there is no statue of limitations once found it is returned.

It hasn't been proven that they were stolen. How can you prove something when everyone is dead!? We will see what the appeal brings...at the very least, the coins should be sold and they get half, there is a precedent set for this.

No there stolen property the US mint never released the 1933 double eagle to the public.Since they didnt go into circulation obviously they were stolen from the mint.So yes it has been proven beyond a doubt there grandfather was a thief.And he stole US property and you want to reward his family come on.

The guy who had these gold coins had one crazy background


theinfounderground.com...

The Secret Service/Treasury could have nabbed him in '44 when one coin was issued an export license to a King.

Your GOV knew he had these for a long long time.

Seems to me this is appropriate. Don't get me wrong I'm no fan of government seizures, but I also don't think it is reasonable that a person could inherit stolen property and profit from the crime.

Stealing is not the way to fight laws that a person does not agree with. This fellow sounds like a crook to me. To bad for the family, but it is what it is I think. I don't see them winning an appeal on this. Unless of course they hire an attorney as crooked as politicians that pulls some legal stunt. It probably won't make it past a single appeal.

Originally posted by jude11
If this isn't outright theft I don't know what is.

During the depression when Franklin Roosevelt ordered people to turn over their gold and so many idiots did so, some decided not to.

en.wikipedia.org...

Executive Order 6102 is an Executive Order signed on April 5, 1933, by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt "forbidding the Hoarding of Gold Coin, Gold Bullion, and Gold Certificates within the continental United States". The order criminalized the possession of monetary gold by any individual, partnership, association or corporation.

If you want to invest in gold - how then do you do it? I see commercials all the time for investing in gold. Now, i understand, you don't actually own the gold, so much as control interest in an amount of gold.. ( however that works) BUT.. wouldnt you then have a Gold Certificate and wouldn't the company who has the gold be illegally owning the gold? I'm so confused. One day I will have about a hundred thousand dollars to invest in gold so i gotta get this cleared up.

Originally posted by BobM88

Originally posted by jude11

Originally posted by randomtangentsrme
reply to post by jude11

 

If I remember the story correct. The grandpa stole the coins

I'm still looking for that actually. From what I've found so far, theft was never proven only suspected.

Peace

Ha! I wondered that, I edited my post above to say...how can they know after all this time? Did someone say "Those were mine...they're circular, have an eagle on 'em...just like mine did, he stole them!!"

Only 7 were made legal, that is where the value comes from. If these are not those 7, they are illegal by default. On the flipside, allowing these to remain in circulation would destroy the value of the ones legally owned.

I'm not one to trust the U.S. government too much, but I have to side with them on this one. It was theft back in the day. Pure and simple. Just because the family held onto them for 80 years doesn't negate that fact. True, the Govt. is being kind of anal about the whole thing, but do you expect more of them?

Originally posted by jude11

Originally posted by randomtangentsrme
reply to post by jude11

 

If I remember the story correct. The grandpa stole the coins

I'm still looking for that actually. From what I've found so far, theft was never proven only suspected.

Peace

People need to separate the coins and the gold issue since they are not the same. In this case the items in question were minted by the US government as offical currency. The government then stopped their production and removed their status of legal tender. Currency belongs to the government in this case and the government is within its right to challenge possession.

Originally posted by Xcathdra

Originally posted by jude11

Originally posted by randomtangentsrme
reply to post by jude11

 

If I remember the story correct. The grandpa stole the coins

I'm still looking for that actually. From what I've found so far, theft was never proven only suspected.

Peace

People need to separate the coins and the gold issue since they are not the same. In this case the items in question were minted by the US government as offical currency. The government then stopped their production and removed their status of legal tender. Currency belongs to the government in this case and the government is within its right to challenge possession.

My only question is this, since it's gold it has a worth outside it's shape as currency. Does the government have to compensate them market value for the gold?

That sucks man! I normally don't complain about life too much, but if that was done to me, by my own fellow citizens, I would probably be driven insane with rage... Not that I love money all that much, but I'm a man of principle, and something about the way that whole thing went down just rubs me the wrong way, sir.

Originally posted by OccamsRazor04
My only question is this, since it's gold it has a worth outside it's shape as currency. Does the government have to compensate them market value for the gold?

Nope.. It would be like a person stealing someone elses car, getting caught, and then asking the owner to reimburse the thief for the loss of the vehicle back to its origional owner as well as any gas the thief bought.

Also as I stated before we need to drop the gold aspect. While gold is very high the worth of the coins are based on their rarity and not gold content.

Theft. They should have at least provided a monetary compensation for their assets deemed illegal. It is criminal behavior like this by our government that begs for violent reaction by our people. They have just ruined that family. Sad day indeed.

EDIT:
If not then seize ALL illegal assets every one holds. Problem is you would be storming the mansions of some very powerful people with search warrants and they don't want to upset their own families and friends.

A Goverment big enough to give you all you want, is big enough to take all you have. Thomas Jefferson. This is the USA. you never really own anything.

mugs these people they must have known the score with grandad --what goes round comes round i was watching the southpark episode last night where gold is on a endless spiral between india and the usa ...
Being made into stuff in india then flown to the us sold then scrapt flown to india to be made again

Originally posted by Xcathdra

Originally posted by OccamsRazor04
My only question is this, since it's gold it has a worth outside it's shape as currency. Does the government have to compensate them market value for the gold?

Nope.. It would be like a person stealing someone else car, getting caught, and then asking the owner to reimburse the thief for the loss of the vehicle back to its origional owner as well as any gas the thief bought.

Also as I stated before we need to drop the gold aspect. While gold is very high the worth of the coins are based on their rarity and not gold content.

If it can not be proven they were stolen, it should be an issue of they were "lost" and never melted. This gives the government the right to melt them, but if I am right they reimbursed people for the loss of their gold coins back in the day.

Originally posted by randomtangentsrme
reply to post by jude11

 

If I remember the story correct. The grandpa stole the coins

Interesting to note that history states there were coins STOLEN, and that this man was a dealer in coins.

It seems to me that in all likelihood these coins were the ones stolen, in which case they did not belong to their family, and they were criminal gains.

Whether you agree with your government or not when it comes to gold, what happened before or the court decision, if these coins were proven to be the ones stolen back then, the jury made the right decision.

I don't think there is a story here. Someone stole some coins, a dealer (lets face it, how many coin dealers would there have been back then, and how likely is it that someone stealing coins would sell them to a coin dealer or involve them somehow!) then gained them, the family found them... they are still stolen property.

If your great grandfather robbed a bank and you found the money buried under the family home a century later do you think you'd have a "right" to it?

They were stolen coins, the family wanted to keep the money, the jury said - rightly - no!

reply to post by jude11


How f@cked up is that.

Something real fishy happened with that jury.

What about the statue of limitations if you we're not caught and prosecuted within 1-7 years you got away with it except for murder.

"On July 30, 2002, one was sold at Sotheby's and it was legally sold.

www.coinworld.com...

court ruling

The Case

Originally posted by antar
The gov is criminal in this action and probably will use them to pay down debt to china. This a valuable lesson to all you who will one day inherit your families treasures and safety deposit boxes... This is important and the gov screwed up by allowing this to become a public spectacle, they should have paid off the honest family and then made profit on the coins.

edit on 7-9-2012 by antar because: (no reason given)

I think a 50/50 split would have been fair, as they did with that one awhile back. They "legalized" the coin, I believe, the it was sold. (no source, going from what I can remember.) the family would have gotten 20-40M. Anyhow, I highly doubt $80M to pay down debt to China was going to be anything to get the gov't excited about.

reply to post by detachedindividual


Agreed, and with the '33 Double Eagle, if someone has them, then they were stolen. None were ever legally released from the mint.

Originally posted by jude11
This is the part that really gets me angry...A jury awarded the Govt. the coins. A jury of citizens! I have to say that a few of these members were most likely bribed to sway the decision. Can I prove it? No. But to see a jury of citizens siding with Govt. on this scale tells me that either they were paid or the selection process was very one-sided.

Jury selection is an art form and defendants in high-end jury trials spare no expense in statistical and psychological methods to determine agreeable jurors. Cases are won or lost during jury selection.

It does not surprise me that the government has mastery over trials like this as they have an unlimited bank account and vast human and educational resources. They cherry-pick jurors too.

We have the best justice that money can buy.

Hide YOUR Gold NOW!
now they know they can do this they will steal your gold to.
so dig lots of deep holes and burie your gold deep.

they have a test case and will use it to take ever one gold.