Must a Pawn Shop Return Stolen Property to Its Owner?

Imagine that someone breaks into your house and steals something. Let’s say it’s a laptop. A week later, you see the laptop in a pawn shop. You want it back, but the shop owner says that he paid $200 for it. Must the shop owner give it back to you for free? Sell it back to you for what he paid for it? Or is he free to sell it to you on whatever terms the two of you negotiate? This appears to be a question that is discussed quite a bit on the internet. See, for example, here, here, here, here, and here. In this post, I give what I think is the correct legal answer. The property belongs to the owner. The general rule is that “[a] purchaser of goods acquires only that title which the transferor had or had power to transfer.” Paulino v. Computer Renaissance, 62 S.W.3d 648 (Mo. Ct. App. 2001). Because “[a] thief’s title to stolen property is void,” i.e., “is no title at all . . . all subsequent transfers of [stolen] property [are] likewise void.” Id. Thus, when the pawnbroker bought your stolen laptop, he did not become the owner of the property. It doesn’t matter whether the pawnbroker bought the property directly from the thief or from someone else who bought or received the property from the thief. No one downstream from the thief in the chain of possession becomes the owner of the property. It’s still your laptop. It doesn’t matter [...]