Is it unethical to use fake Amazon packages as "bait" to combat against "Porch Pirates"?

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59. notwithstanding your tone, we're mostly in agreement

yes, some degree of force may be legal to try to stop a crime already in progress. personally, i think texas goes way overboard, but yes, deadly force to protect... stuff. ok. for me, i think any force has to be limited to what's reasonable necessary to stop the crime and recover the stolen items. anything beyond that is unethical in my view, even if it may be legal or in any event, legal consequences are rare.

i meant "later" to mean after the crime had been completed, as a parallel to when the porch pirate opens the booby-trapped package back in their own home. glitter bombs, stink bombs, don't help in stopping the crime or retrieving the item. they're about hurting someone else (even if the hurt is very minor) for the sake of revenge. i don't think that is ethical.

banks using dye is largely meant to identify the stolen money rather than the robbers. the money legally belongs to the bank still, so there's no problem with them marking it. to the extent the thieves get dyed as well, this may help identify and catch them, which is i have no problem with.

back to the porch pirates, if a glitter bomb or stink bomb were used in conjunction with calling the police and the glitter or stink helped identify the criminals, then i would have less of a problem with it, though i would still prefer it be coordinated with the police in advance rather than as a vigilante. i don't recall seeing any youtube videos where the police were contacted and the glitter/stink were used to help identify the perpetrators.