report stolen govt ACOG or mind my own business?

[NoDakRoughrider]

So on a local for sale site I run across an add for an ACOG. Seller states in ad
"This is an awesome setup. It has seen action in Iraq an Afghanistan. It still has desert dust on the lens covers for the optic (I think that adds character). It still has reference markings on it from the grease pen used during tightening down".
From what I understood and I could be wrong none of the military optics have been sold as surplus to us civilians.
I cannot tolerate theives or liars. So do I forget I saw the ad, report it to the site or report it to some govt agency? If so who do I report it to?

And he lives in a town with an airforce base, so it seems plausible.

[steyrman13]

Some are obtained legally. Some are personal purchases used over seas. I would move on

[Kchen986]

Could be a personal purchase. Depending on unit, may have been given a RDS and the soldier self-purchased a magnified optic. I would move on.

[scoutfsu99]

There were also a bunch of optics (improperly) DRMO'ed last year. AP's, EO's, Triji's, Leupy's, etc...even though they show up as .gov/.mil optics, they were still released through no theft or ill will. What becomes of them is a different story.

Mind your own business.

[uffdaphil]

As long as it's not wholesale black market type actions, I don't mind some personal "liberation" of gov't property from a war zone. Lots of greatest-generation and WW1 1911s passed down as heirlooms for example. The scandalous low pay does not begin to make up for high risk, extended misery duty. If you want to risk the stockade for a little loot, I'm fine with it. Sometimes I wish I'd smuggled my off the books M2 carbine or grease gun home from Nam.

[NoDakRoughrider]

Thanks for clearing that up.

[Eurodriver]

As long as it's not wholesale black market type actions, I don't mind some personal "liberation" of gov't property from a war zone. Lots of greatest-generation and WW1 1911s passed down as heirlooms for example. The scandalous low pay does not begin to make up for high risk, extended misery duty. If you want to risk the stockade for a little loot, I'm fine with it. Sometimes I wish I'd smuggled my off the books M2 carbine or grease gun home from Nam.

In a nutshell, I agree. But there are exceptions. Unfortunately because we have no history of these items we cannot know exactly how they were acquired.

For example, if I found an ACOG in Iraq and hadn't heard anything about a lost one then I'd toss it in my bag and truck on. The poor bastard who lost it has probably already been NJP'd and the serial number has been removed from the CMR anyway. Turning it in is just going to result in a gain for your using unit and it being put in an already overstocked armory. With GCSS-MC it'd be much easier to find out who it originally belonged(s?) to, but that's a separate issue.

But we don't know if this ACOG was acquired that way. How do we know it wasn't some slimeball LCpl who just took his buddy's ACOG off and stole it (resulting in said buddy getting an undeserved NJP) and is now selling it illegally? Of course it could have been a private purchase but with the USMC issuing ACOGs to nearly everyone and the Big Army having Aimpoints, it's unlikely.

I don't touch potentially used government stuff with a 10 foot pole on EE sites. There is too much risk, but I'm not going to throw a guy under the bus for owning something he picked up and is now selling. That's what my tax dollars are for, and they are used very effectively.

[uffdaphil]

Good points Euro. Knowing the provenance makes all the difference.

[M4Guru]

It's all fun and games until some poor PFC bought an ACOG out-of-pocket with great intentions before deployment and you cause him to have $10K in attorney fees...

[TehLlama]

I don't touch potentially used government stuff with a 10 foot pole on EE sights. There is too much risk, but I'm not going to throw a guy under the bus for owning something he picked up and is now selling. That's what my tax dollars are for, and they are used very effectively.

Yup - I'm pretty sure the TA31 I bought from fleabay years back was an improperly DRMO'd item (checked with Trijicon, it was all suspect, but had been sent back to them for repairs too). Just gave up and resold it for the same reason, it's not worth whatever I'm saving to accumulate grey market stuff in the first place.