Bike locked to mine: am I allowed to cut through the lock on my own? Bob locked his bike. Two hours after he found another bike locked to his. Is he allowed to cut through the lock that doesn't belong to him on his own? I am mostly interested in the following locations: California, United States Massachusetts, United States Paris, France Seoul, South Korea
This is a fun one. I don't have any particular domain knowledge about this question. So this one is just a guess. My answer is strictly from a practical standpoint. If I were faced with this situation in real life, what would I do? (Technical point: I feel the vagueness of the language, "Is he allowed to" allows me to answer this way.) My assumptions: My assumptions are that: The cost of consulting an attorney on the matter or filing a law suit would likely exceed the combined total cost of the bike and the lock. Usually, the law follows what "feels right" and what makes common sense to the average person. Usually. Not always. But usually. (Legal principles: "Equity follows the law." and "Equity does not aid a party at fault." See this reference.) What I would do: So, I would do the following... (if I were in the U.S.) I would simply cut the bike lock and repossess my bike (unilaterally) if and only if all the following conditions were true in the situation: I could confirm without any doubt that the bike in question is actually my bike and not just another one that looks just like it. I could not find anyone around who looks like they might be the owner of the lock or the other bike. If I could find the owner of either the lock or the bike it is highly likely there was some mistake and the situation could be resolved directly with them. There are no law officers nearby. If so, I would engage them in helping me rectify the matter. If they said it was a "civil matter" and refused to get involved, I would proceed to the next item on this list. I had the tools handy and available to cut or break the lock. If any of the above conditions were false, I would flag down the nearest law officer or call one to the scene to help resolve the issue. Any other approach would seem impractical to me on the basis of my above assumption numbered 1. If I were anywhere outside the U.S., I would involve the local authorities without considering the unilateral repossession option.
Not successfully It is not required that a person knows they are dealing with an agent of the principal rather than the principal directly - an agent speaks with the principal’s voice. Robert has consented to allow Elizabeth to act as his agent. It actually doesn’t matter if he consented before she acted or afterwards, he has agreed to be bound by Elizabeth’s actions. Rachel &amp; Jared have agreed to enter the lease and indicated as much by signing the document. It doesn’t matter who signed it for the landlord or even if it was signed - leases have to be in writing but there is no common law rule that they need to be signed.
The club renting space from the shopping center makes no difference; the difference is public vs. private land. The legal controller of the land you are on - whether the shopping center, the club or private land around the shopping center - can ask you to leave at any time for any reason. There is no wiggle room. A controller is not necessarily the owner - a tenant is a controller as is an emergency service executing legitimate control. The police are law enforcement; if you don't leave private land by request, their duty is to remove you at the request of the land owner. Private security also has the same function, though their jurisdiction is more limited off their property, as they are private hired by the shopping center or club. Either would ask you to leave, and if you refuse, you could be arrested for trespassing. If arrested, the local district or county attorney would have some discretion on prosecuting you for trespassing.
Depending on the bridge, you might be trespassing in some way. Railway bridges are the property of the railway company, they don't allow to go there unless specifically allowed and even the absence of a sign is not an ok in those cases. Similarly, highway bridges usually are communal property and they don't need to be marked as off limits if there are laws that prohibit being there. The absence of signs and fencing is not a carte balance to go there: If your starting point for the climbing is not easily accessible, they don't have to fence it. But besides trespassing, you might make a huge dookey: Depending on the attorney general, you might be, in Austria, in violation of § 46 StVO for being a pedestrian on the Highway, as the bridge in whole is part of the highway structure. Even if you are under the lanes, you are technically on or inside the highway structure. If the attorney really wants you in, they could pull out § 89 StGB "endangerment" as well as the § 176 / § 177 "endangerment of the commonality" (by reckless or negligence). After all, you might or might not be climbing the bridge to perform something to endanger all the people using it. In Germany, you will get fined for violating traffic laws if you go onto railway tracks or climb onto a railway bridge as you violate the railway code and the minimum charge is 25 €. You could get also sued for Reckless endangerment of the train traffic (§ 315 StGB) and locked up for between 6 months and 10 years. If you do delay trains in any way (and even if it is to allow a crew to get to you), you are also liable damages - this is very easy in the 5 to 6 digits. Similarly, if it was a highway, you'd get billed 10 € for being on foot on a motorway without special privilege under $ 25 StVO and again, you could get jailed in extreme cases under § 315b StGB.
There's the question whether something is lost property or abandoned property. You'd be allowed to keep abandoned property, but keeping lost property without looking for the owner is in many places considered theft. A car on your land is quite likely abandoned by the last driver (people don't usually lose cars). But the question is whether it is abandoned by the owner; if the car looks like it has some value then it is unlikely to be abandoned by the owner and more likely that it has been stolen. I'd report the car to the police; then it's up to them to find the owner or not. If they can find him, and the car was not abandoned, but actually lost (unlikely) or stolen (more likely), you have the satisfaction of being an honest person helping either a very stupid car owner or a crime victim to get their property back. If they can't find him, usually the property will then belong to the finder.
In the US it is generally illegal for you to open somebody else's mailbox. Your best course of action is to contact your neighbor and let them retrieve the package for you. In practice it might depend on your relationship with your neighbor. If you are good friends, they are unlikely to object or report you to the authorities as they'll be willing to trust that you were just retrieving your mis-delivered package. If you don't know your neighbor, or if you are on poor terms with them, they have no reason to trust your motives and they could reasonably think you were stealing from them or invading their privacy. As a tangential footnote: yes, people really can face federal charges for tampering with mailboxes. Recently a former city prosecutor and a former police chief for Honolulu were convicted of attempting to frame a relative on federal charges for stealing a mail box. A mistrial was declared on the mailbox theft charges, and in the process, an extensive web of corruption was revealed involving the former prosecutor and former police chief.
Neighbors(including us) around the property started to mow the part in front of their yard(the weeds grew very high) and continue to do so(is it illegal for us to mow this overgrown land?). There are probably city codes around maintenance of lawns, cutting grass and clearing weeds. You should alert the relevant authorities and they will make sure that the maintenance occurs. You should probably not do it yourself since (a) you don't owe the owner any favors and (b) you might cause trouble for yourself. Recently there was some mowing by large tractors but very little was cut and most of it grew back. The question is really whether their activities bring them into compliance with applicable city codes or not. If they are compliant and you simply don't like how they maintain their property, that is tough luck. If they are not compliant, you are well within your rights to vigorously report them to relevant code enforcement authorities. This overgrown golf course is home to many wild animals(coyotes, snakes, foxes, alligators, etc..) See above 1) Is there any legal action that we can take to force the land owner to maintain the land? See above 2) Could this land somehow under some law be divided and given to the maintainers. This is an interesting question. Technically there are circumstances wherein you could take what's called adverse possession of part or all of the property. This would probably include doing things like actually residing on some piece of that land and establishing a residence there - perhaps getting mail or paying taxes there or paying utilities or operating a business - for a certain period of time without any interference from the technical owner. If you can meet the requirements of adverse possession then you might be able to become a legal owner. Unless you have little to lose, however, actually doing it might be difficult. 3) Is it legal to walk/drive on this land. (I see people walking their dogs, and driving atv's and motor bikes on the golf course) Unless you have been given notice otherwise, it is perfectly legal to walk wherever you like. It is the owner's responsibility to provide reasonable notice and take reasonable precautions against unwanted trespass; e.g., putting up a wall or fence, closing and/or locking a door or gate, posting signs and/or hiring security to patrol the property and enforce property rights - or occasionally checking to make sure their property isn't overrun with squatters.
What is the correct way to handle this situation? Strictly speaking, each driver exceeding the speed limit is in violation of the traffic sign even if everybody else also infringes it. Thus it is completely valid for the police to pull &amp; fine anyone from among those drivers. Statutes like the one you mention are intended for scenarios where a driver departs significantly --and for no apparent [lawful] reason-- from the speed limit, such as driving at 20 mph in a 55 mph zone. Typically a driver would not get pulled over in the scenario you mention (driving at 62 mph where everybody else drives at 65 mph). The exception would be some police department(s) requiring its cops to meet a quota of fines per week, but that would be quite a questionable practice having nothing to do with the legislative intent. Speed limits are supposed to represent normal and reasonable movement of traffic. If informed consensus is that a particular speed limit is inconsistent with that principle (for instance, where limit is artificially low and raising it would not compromise safety), then a request could be submitted to the Oregon Department of Transportation.