About 2 weeks ago my sister-in-law's boyfriend borrowed $60 from my husband. They refused to give it back and an argument insued. While from this sprouted the fact that my husband has a little girls scooter and some speakers of theirs, and they have my husbands $100+ tools and our tent. We have been trying since to set up an "exchange" to give them their stuff and get ours back. They keep on stalling though. Both of them have a reputation of pawning stuff so we think that may be what they did. We have reciepts showing that the tools are outs (not the tent though). We told them that if we don't get our stuff soon we are going to call the cops. They keep saying that won't do us any good cause we have their stuff too. However we have text messages of this whole endeavor and from those proof that we have been nothing but cooperative and TRYING to give them their stuff (though there have of course been some nasty words exchanged). What legal grounds do we have to get our stuff back? PLEASE ONLY PEOPLE WITH EXPERIENCE IN LAW OR LAW ENFORCEMENT! No offense to anyone just want to make sure we have our ducks in order here.

Please don't attempt to direct who will or who will not answer. This is an open message board and (sometimes unfortunately) everyone is entitled to an "opinion."

What exactly do you want advice about?

How to get your "stuff" back? Sue them in Small Claims Court. Prove the property is yours and provide info on the cost - receipts always work!

How to get the loan back? Sue them in Small Claims Court. Oral agreements are binding.

Will the Police get involved? I very much doubt it. This is a back and forth argument, more civil than criminal (nothing was stolen), and the Police are not going to settle a civil argument, particularly when it's "sort of" family.

When you sue in Small Claims Court they will probably countersue for the value of their "stuff" which they claim you have.

A Judge will decide which side is truthful and award damages - or the return of the "stuff."

You can always find someone neutral to accept their "stuff" and return it to them - if anyone wants to get in the middle of all of this. That, of course, does not settle the loan and/or whether all of their "stuff" came back.

... my sister-in-law's boyfriend ...

Does her husband know she has a "boyfriend"?

As Shakespeare wrote, "neither a borrower nor a lender be".

At JudyKayTee: Actually we can say that the tools were stolen. My Mother-In-Law had him working on her Jimmy and he was using our tools. We told him previously he was never to take the tools off our property. The day that the argument ensued we found out that he did. Also (don't know if it helps much) but the boyfriend has been in jail several times for theift. Our main question is if we call the cops will they help us go over and get our stuff. Again we have been TRYING to give them their stuff back, we just want someone to go with us to their house because the boyfriend is VIOLENT. He actually attacked me once when him and her dated the first time (that relationship broke up because he abused her, she claims he's not now).

At AKLawyer: What??

No, I don't think the Police will get involved. If you had reported the tools missing immediately upon finding out they were missing it would be different. No, the Police will NOT get involved in a civil matter.

Re-read what I posted. I think I covered it all.

Couldn't find the edit button since they remodeled this place so I'll edit this way. What we have been trying to do is set up a time and place where my Mother-In-Law was going to meet my Sister-In-Law and they were going to exchange the stuff. Then they changed the date to Monday last minute, my Mother-In-Law said no and we knew it was because they were supposed to go camping this weekend and probably wanted to use our tent. Now they are saying that they aren't going to give it to us at all pretty much.

- And I am telling you that your only recourse is Small Claims Court. The Police are not going to be interested.

So it's either Small Claims OR forget about getting your "stuff" back.

As I said - there are no other choices at this point.