A Nebraska woman allegedly found a lucrative quirk at a gas station pump — double-swipe the rewards card and get free gas!
Unfortunately for her, you can’t do that, prosecutors said. The 45-year-old woman was arrested March 6 and faces felony theft charges accusing her of a crime that cost the gas station nearly $28,000.
Prosecutors say the woman exploited the system over a period of several months. Police learned of the problem in October when the loss-prevention manager at Bosselman Enterprises reported that the company’s Pump & Pantry in Lincoln had been scammed.
Where did anyone say this person was an innocent victim? No one is debating she took advantage here, the issue is no one seems to be putting any culpability on the company who made the pump. The issue here is a slippery slope as it expects a duty to report the error from her that should not be there legally. I could see some other charge like fraud be appropriate maybe, but theft is such a bad thing to charge her with.
Explicitly? Nowhere. But for this to be a slippery slope to innocent victims being held criminally accountable for malfunctioning technology, she has to be.
Is this a joke? This comment section is awash with people saying they fucked up, so she had the right to take advantage of it. I sidestepped this question intentionally, and specifically addressed the claim that punishing her for this would almost inevitably lead to actual innocent people being punished.
She’s not being held legally responsible for not reporting it, she is being held responsible for it for exploiting it to steal tens of thousands of dollars worth of gas.
No she does not have to be an innocent victim for this to be a slippery slope, this is just false equivalency.
Ah, I did not realize they charged the company with a crime. Oh they did not?
That is functionally the same thing, if she did report it after the first time I am sure no harm no foul. But if she did not report it in your eyes it is now theft (remember she stumbled upon this). If you think about this critically the number of times should not change the nature of the act.
Could you explain what the false equivalency is? I can’t make any sense of what you think it might be.
You think they should be held liable for making a mistake and being taken advantage of? This is blaming the victim.
I started my initial post by very clearly stating “It comes down to intent.” The claim that I’m equating one who accidentally benefits from a glitch, to someone intentionally exploiting it over the course of months to steal tens of thousands of dollars, is ridiculous.
I do think people have the moral obligation to help someone out if they make a mistake and are vulnerable to being taken advantage of, but I certainly do not think someone should be held criminally liable for not alerting someone/something to their mistake.
Her being innocent or not has nothing to do with the issue of setting a bad precedent in this case being a slippery slope. If using the provided pump software with provided rewards card (granted in a way not foreseen) can be considered theft then the slippery slope is what else can be considered theft.
Yes, they should be held liable. And then hold the makers of the pump software liable in turn. This should be a civil case between companies not a criminal case against a customer.
I agree that there might be a case for something else (conversion, fraud, conspiracy), but this is once again where that slope comes in. Relying on proof of intent is problematic to say the least. And yes the line of whats a whoopsy vs whats theft will come up if this goes forward. This is not ideal.
None of this has to do with a false equivalency. Are you sure you know what the term even means?
They made a mistake and their mistake didn’t even harm anyone. What on earth would they be liable for?
Holy shit. You have no idea how our legal system works. It’s innocent until proven guilty. You don’t have to prove there was no intent, they would have to prove you did have intent.
This is moving the goal posts. We’re talking about it being a slippery slope from her intentionally exploiting something to steal tens of thousands of dollars of gas, to someone accidentally benefiting one time from a glitch in a system. What counts as a violation of the law is part of the system, which is why we have trials with a “jury of your peers” to determine whether or not you crossed the line. Is it ideal? Of course not. But it is reality.