An Arizona Department of Public Safety (DPS) office was arrested because he is suspected of stealing weapons from the department:
An Arizona Department of Public Safety trooper was arrested Thursday night on suspicion of theft and weapons violations after officials say he kept eight flashbang grenades from a 2011 training session instead of turning them over to the department, according to court records.
But the question remains, can you steal from a thief? The department’s weapons are paid for with tax dollars and civil forfeiture funding. In other words the department’s weapons are paid for with stolen wealth. Assuming John Petculescu, the man who is charged with stealing the weaponry, is a tax payer, which is a pretty good assumption since he was a DPS employee, he has just as much of a right to those weapons as any other tax payer or victim of civil forfeiture. Unfortunately, the government has claimed a monopoly on theft for itself, which gives it the option to severely punish anybody who challenges its monopoly.