To think charity shops should check pockets before they put things out for sale?

[GinBunny]

I buy a lot from charity shops, and have found many dirty tissues in the pockets, but occasionally have found money too which I always put in the donation tin on the counter.
Last weekend DH bought a jacket. When he got it home and checked the pockets he found a butterfly knife in the inside pocket. I was surprised and a bit taken aback when he told me that these knives are illegal, but didn't give it much thought until we went out with a friend tonight and told him about the find. The first thing he said was what if this knife has been used in criminal activity which has freaked me out a bit. Obviously now it has DH fingerprints on it so what if it has been? But also what if someone had bought the jacket and then used the knife? Wondering if there would be any comeback on the charity shop for selling the jacket with an illegal knife in it?
Just wondering what you think (especially worried about the fact that it might have been used in a crime - am I being paranoid?)

If you repeatedly find things in pockets in the same charity shop then yes it is poor management. Poor training of volunteers, and/or poor supervision.

As a regular purchaser of clothes from charity shops
you are talking utter bullshit
ALL clothes are steam cleaned and checked before being put on sale - often at central warehouses
there is not a CHANCE that a knife made it through to sale

if you are telling the truth, name the shop
or you are a liar

You'd be surprised, we had some very dodgy characters disposing off donating dodgy/skanky stuff, and seeming to think that then justified them trying to steal the decent stuff on sale.

"ALL clothes are steam cleaned and checked before being put on sale - often at central warehouses"

I can guarantee they are most definately NOT

ALL clothes are steam cleaned and checked before being put on sale
What nonsense!

We have about 10 charity shops in our small town and although one of the bigger charities swaps and shares its clothes with other shops they all process their own donations in much the same way. And that means volunteers carting the black bags up the stairs,emptying onto a table and sorting through for rags before hanging up usable items to be steamed and then set aside on a hanging rack to be priced.At some point pockets may be checked but its down to the shops routines.
I wouldn't worry about finding random things in a pocket . If its money or saleable jewellery it goes back to the shop. Anything else can be disposed of.

when I volunteered in a charity shop, I found a bag that had been put out in the shop with a used nappy in it.

Definitely wasn't any steaming of clothes going on in that charity shop!

I volunteer in a charity shop and nothing is steam cleaned! And we just give the items a quick check over and maybe a wipe with a baby wipe if there are marks.
There is a huge range of volunteers - weekend helpers like me, elderly people, people doing community service, teenagers (mainly just doing 1-2 hours for D of E) so up to 10 people are doing the sorting each day. We are all volunteers at the end of the day so although we've been trained to check the clothes there's no guarantee that every pocket is checked every time. Some of of our volunteers are not exactly thrilled to be there IYSWIM.
I love it though - you never know what will come in ;)

ALL clothes are steam cleaned and checked before being put on sale - often at central warehouses

Er, NOPE!
I took some of DH's shirts into a charity shop last weekend
They took them out of the bag, put them straight onto hangers from behind the till and hung them out on the rail before I'd even left the shelf.

It was a branch of Fara, before you are so rude as to accuse me of lying.

OK OK
I'm lucky to have posh charity shops
and I have friends who work in many of them so know that they do

but still cannot believe a knife making it through sorting hanging and labelling by week and size

Wasn't black bommer jacket was it as I just remembered I didn't check pockets before I hanged it up, steamed it and labelled it.

Please people when sending manky shit clothes in, mark it as rags that way it can go straight into recycle and chipped cups are of no use to anyone.

Please people when sending manky shit clothes in, mark it as rags that way it can go straight into recycle and chipped cups are of no use to anyone

Yes! And please don't send things like folders your teenage kids used for their GCSE's all scuffed and creased with their names written on in pen. No-one wants to buy them!
Ditto half used packs of stickers, old grubby crafty bits from when your kids were little - aka 15 years ago etc. If it looks dirty and broken then its unsaleable!

Smiling to myself at the thought of a knife wielding crim donating his old clothes to the charity shop
Well, when you put it like that...

You do realise that you never admit to BU on AIBU.