How to check if the iPhone is stolen?

I'm looking to buy an iphone 5c but want to make sure that it is not stolen. Now that iphone has come up with a lock that they place on all stolen/lost phones and any SIM card placed into those phones gets fried, I need a different way of seeing how a phone has this lock on it if it happens to be stolen/lost. Of course, most people would never admit if they stole the phone or found it, so there's no telling if your buying a phone that works or a phone that'll just fry your SIM card. With all that said, is there different ways to check if the phone has this lock other then just placing your SIM card inside to check?

Short Answer No (not unless your standing in front of person, erase and reset all settings and have him enter apple id info to unlock phone from his account).

Have the person you're going to buy it from meet you at an apple store. There are two lockout issues. One is with ios7. Ios 7 requires the person to enter his apple id password to be able to setup the phone as new. The other is through the carrier. If the ESN (unique number assigned to every phone) is reported stolen, the carrier will not activate phone on any account. Apple will be able to transfer everything over for you. Once you're setup and running then pay him. This is the only way to do it. If the person is out of town don't buy it from him/her-unless you know him.

You can ask for the ESN number on his phone (if he doesn't know ask him to call carrier). Get it and then call the carrier to see if the phone has ever been reported stolen. Again this only solves the ESN issue and not the IOS 7 issue.

You can get the imie (esn) number then check it on one of the many websites but that is not all you must worry about. The seller can sell you a perfect phone, with a clean imie then after the sale report the phone as lost-or-stolen which will deactivate the phone. Blacklisting the phone, making it useless as a phone ever again.

If you don't know nor trust the person with the iPhone then don't waste your money on such a highly risky deal. Call your local Apple store to ask for more details.

As mentioned, the best way is to have them meet at the store to check ESN number. This will not prevent them from reporting it stolen afterwards, but you could request for them to write a receipt or even grab a receipt book and make one yourself, having them sign it before you pay. Then if it's reported stolen, you have the proof you bought it.