Shady scrap metal dealers, I guess. Maybe there’s some reason that they’re hard to catch in the act. One dealer in Contra Costa called the cops when someone brought in the memorial plaque off of the Vietnam memorial, if I remember correctly.
What’s the scrap value of brass? This is stupid.
Generally speaking, these "entitled" sanctuary tenured individuals will return by night burn down your scrapyard and office if they suspect you have violated the local "brothers don't snitch" policy. (Ya don't have to be a brother to have it apply to you.)
The local police don't have much sympathy for the owner who must be around 24/7 as the cops need to raise traffic ticket revenue on the graveyard to please the Mayor, so no drive by's in YOUR part of town,.... unless it's to express indignation because they heard you keep a shotgun around,.... from the environmental code enforcement officer looking for PCB's from transformers, he'll help you regularly with close support.
Actually scrap metal dealers generally give way more cooperation than they are protected, rewarded, or acknowledged for. All those items are real incidents, I had a friend in the business.