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Where do stolen bikes go?
- glonq 4y agoStolen bikes go to Vancouver's downtown east side. Trust me, I know this.
- jmclnx 4y agoThey used something called a smarttag, not sure what that is. But I wonder if one could put an RFID tag inside the frame some where ? And I wonder if you have a steel frame would that interfere with it ?
- Zak 4y agoMost metals, as well as carbon fiber will interfere with reading an RFID tag. It's more likely one could be put on top of a bike frame and concealed by paint, or inside the seat than inside the frame.
- tleb_ 4y agoRFID probably doesn't bring much, engraving is easier and is hard to remove without marks. About that, France has an official method of tagging bikes which has been mandatory on new bikes since jan 2021. See [0] for doc in English and [1] for a video. [0]: https://www.bicycode.org/pages-1/Documents_PDF/plaquette__Bicycode_GB_082013_r.pdf https://www.bicycode.org/pages-1/Documents_PDF/plaquette__Bi... [1]: https://www.bicycode.org/faire-marquer-son-velo.rub-2/le-marquage-bicycode-c-est-quoi.rub-10/ https://www.bicycode.org/faire-marquer-son-velo.rub-2/le-mar...
- alwayslikethis 4y agoSounds like a gross expansion of government tracking power to make it mandatory. This is equivalent to license plates on cars, which is already used to track people around in many countries.
- kataklasm 4y agoYea, license plates... What an abhorrent government overreach! I wish they didn't exist, at least then hit and runs would finally skyrocket!
- forinti 4y agoI can't imagine it being worthwhile to take a bike very far unless it is a very expensive bike. If they are normal bikes, you would have to transport them in numbers, and it would be hard to explain it if you got caught. And you would need a van. Best solution: steal local, sell local for fast turnover of minimal stocks. I lost my bike twice in Cambridge: once found it around the corner and another in the police depo. So someone had just taken it to get somewhere.
- seanmcdirmid 4y agoIn Seattle, high end bikes are targeted to be disassembled for components. The components can then easily be fenced for drug money.
- at-fates-hands 4y agoI remember my co-worker at the bike shop talking about this and how people in the area will sand their frames down and remove labels and anything else that would give their bike a look and feel of being expensive. Even adding duct and black electrical tape to ward off thieves from going after their bikes.
- denton-scratch 4y agoI saw a decent bike a while back that had had newspaper glued all over the frame.
- londons_explore 4y agoWrite your phone number all over every part in permanent marker. Nobody will buy something covered in phone numbers without at least calling the number. The thief can't be bothered to repaint the whole bike to cover it. Hence, the bike is now worthless to a thief, so it won't get stolen.
- _Wintermute 4y ago
- jacquesm 4y agoThe first line on the Amsterdam stolen bike report form at the local police station reads: "Waar heeft u het rijwiel zelf gestolen?" Which translates as: "Where did you steal the bike yourself?" So at least in Amsterdam this fact was common knowledge ;)
- ornornor 4y agoI don’t understand this. Are they assuming everyone reporting a theft stole the bike they’re reporting in the first place? Even if that was the case, who in their right mind would admit it on a police report?
- jacquesm 4y agoIt is a joke...
- 0cVlTeIATBs 4y agoAre the police good-humored? Or is it not on the form, but a quip to poke fun at law enforcement, or at common bike "borrowing" in the city?
- jacquesm 4y agoThe latter. It isn't rare at all to have your bike stolen and the less fortunate have a choice of buying a new one or a second hand one, and that second hand one my be of questionable provenance. Bought on a bridge was an expression when I lived in Amsterdam. I've yet to have a bike stolen but I've always been completely paranoid about it taking my bike into stores and apartments :) This is a lot easier with a Brompton than with my current bike though.
- ornornor 4y agoI didn’t hear the tone in your text
- Cieplak 4y agoIf one's bike is stolen in the San Francisco Bay Area, there's a small but significant chance you can find it for sale at the Laney College Flea Market (e.g. [1]). [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/BAbike/comments/8mmrne/stolen_bike_recovered_at_oakland_flea_market/ https://www.reddit.com/r/BAbike/comments/8mmrne/stolen_bike_...
- actually_a_dog 4y agoIn the Oakland/Berkeley/Albany/El Cerrito area, you want to check out Karim's in Berkeley.
- jerkstate 4y agolol, that shop is the first thing I thought of when I read the headline
- actually_a_dog 4y agoYeah, Karim got raided a few years back but they couldn't make anything stick. Most people don't even record serial numbers on their bikes, much less register them with any type of organization that police can check for stolen bikes.
- ElfinTrousers 4y agoOr under the Division Street overpass, but I disclaim responsibility if you go looking there.
- mrexroad 4y agoBay Area here. Kid’s bike was stolen from driveway (lock clipped) and I found it online a few hours later. I called police non-emergency line and told them I had already set up a meeting to “buy it”; they offered to assist if an officer was available, and I brought a “tough” buddy in case not. Thief had a much bigger buddy hanging out ~50’ away (cop recognized them immediately). In the end: officer showed up, perp got arrested, and my kid got their bike back.
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- isoprophlex 4y agoOnce I lost a bike that was parked right outside my house. Couple of days later I saw a guy ride around on my bike! I sprinted over and somewhat aggressively yelled "you're on my bike, buddy!" He got off, very politely handed me back my bike, and thanked me for letting him borrow it. Almost made me feel like I was the bad guy in the situation. Anyway I guess in some cases, a stolen bike doesn't go far at all.
- quacked 4y ago> Almost made me feel like I was the bad guy in the situation. Many people who choose to live outside square-lawed society rely on people remaining docile and sticking to principle in order to prey on them, or at least to live a lifestyle where they don't have to collaborate with larger society to reap its rewards. It took me years to un-program "assume good intent and empathy" with people I didn't know that were trying to take advantage of me. I simply can't stand thieves. I wish that we had really great public services and transportation--not only would this reduce a huge amount of current theft, it would make actual theft obviously inexcusable.
- jackmott42 4y agoYeah, every homeless person I have ever talked to has had some bullshit story. Its almost as if the impulse to spew bullshit is the primary cause of homelessness. Or some inevitable consequence of most mental health problems. Its so reliable that it makes me question the idea that housing costs are the primary cause of homelessness, but perhaps that just pushes more people on the mental margins over the edge.
- Gh0stRAT 4y agoHumans are narrative creatures. We literally think in stories, so it's not surprising to me that homeless people have a sad story that explains their homelessness. We all tell ourselves stories (whether true or not) to process our actions and their consequences. For people who have been victimized, they sometimes become a slave to the story they tell themselves which can lead to learned helplessness.
- refuse 4y agoThere was a security researcher in NYC that wrote about recovering his stolen scooter with an Airtag that discussed part of this question. At least some of the shops know they've got stolen merch and actively look for Airtags or other trackers. Found it: https://www.cnet.com/culture/guy-successfully-hunts-down-his-stolen-scooter-using-apple-airtags/ https://www.cnet.com/culture/guy-successfully-hunts-down-his...
- ornornor 4y agoI have an airtag on mine but I’m not super convinced it will make a difference: - whenever I pick up the bike to ride it after a long period of not using it (say overnight or after a day of work), the airtag starts ringing. I don’t know why it does that but it would for sure tip the thief off - don’t iPhones and maybe androids now show some kind of notification and offer to disable the tag if a tag you don’t own starts following you? That would also prevent me from finding the bike - AirTags don’t report their altitude, only their location. Good luck figuring out in which apartment and on which floor it’s kept. Police would most likely decline to help as they can’t search every apartment
- none_to_remain 4y agoI bet those AirTag dealies don't include any mechanism that disables themselves if the speaker is physically defeated
- Gigachad 4y agoThey don't. And you can silence them with any amount of pressure on the outer case.
- blackboxlogic 4y agoAir tags ring so abusers can't use them to track a person secretly. The speaker can be disabled though.
- lkbm 4y agoI've always figured that if I buy a bike from Craigslist, I should check the serial number and look it up on bikeindex.org. If I ran a used bike shop, that would definitely be part of my procedure.
- lucumo 4y agoThis is not really surprising to locals. The joke was always that if your bike is stolen when you get back, you'd just steal another one and keep the circulation going. During the 90s the stories were about heroin junkies selling bikes for 25 NLG (11.34 EUR). Clearly not the type of people with the organizational skills to set up an international crime syndicate. These were stories, and it's good/interesting to check in case they were wrong, but the results are as one would expect. (Another common observational joke about inner city bikes is that the value of the locks commonly exceed the value of the bikes they lock.)
- akira2501 4y agoWhen the article stated “We thought bikes might be stolen and sent abroad." I nearly spat out my coffee. It really is amusing to watch MIT laboratory types spend a bunch of time and effort to rediscover what was plainly known beforehand.
- TechBro8615 4y agoYou've got to give them some credit. MIT laboratory types are apparently clever enough to get funding for a multi-month "research trip" to Amsterdam.
- eythian 4y agoEh, in Amsterdam you'll get plenty of people mentioning that there's people in vans who go and steal a bunch of bikes at night (scoping them and sometimes locking them with their own lock during the day), and driving them off to somewhere in Eastern Europe. I'm not sure particularly of the truth of this, beyond this article suggesting it's probably not the case, but it's definitely something in the popular consciousness there.
- Scoundreller 4y agoThing is, "dutch bikes" often don't have a great reputation. Few moving parts, so very reliable, but slow as fuck. Single speed, so crap for anywhere with even tiny hills. Rear coaster brakes. Front drum brakes if you're lucky. Again, problematic if you can gain speed on a decline or otherwise need to stop quickly because you have inadequate bicycle infra. 10kg of low-grade steel tube and heavy af steel wheels (stuff that spins is effectively 2x as heavy).
- munificent 4y agoThere was an interesting article a while back about what happens to stolen bikes in Seattle: https://www.seattlemet.com/news-and-city-life/2014/10/this-is-what-happens-to-your-bike-after-its-stolen-october-2014 https://www.seattlemet.com/news-and-city-life/2014/10/this-i...
- jmyeet 4y agoProperty theft can be broadly separated into two categories: opportunistic and professional. You leave your wallet on a restaurant table by accident it may well get stolen opportunistically. The thief may have limited or no history of theft. An opportunity merely presented itself. It could also be teenagers stealing a car for a joyride. The second, bigger category is professional theft. Note that "professional" here is statement about skill or even organization. It's just done as a source of income. So when you see anything stolen at scale the first thing to consider is how easily is this converted into money because that's where the majority of it goes. So for stolen bikes it surprises me not at all that they stay local. I imagine an awful lot of bikes are sold privately through predictable channels (eg Craigslist, FB Marketplace, flea markets). It may not even be pawn shops because those generally have ID requirements. Higher end bikes may end up being shipped (eg [1]) because the more expensive and rarer (and thus more identifiable) a bike, the more risk in selling it locally and the harder it is to maybe find a buyer. I'm actually surprised so many people report stolen bikes. Like what does this do, really? Is there really going to be an insurance claim? If it's thousands of dollars I would totally understand but most bikes are cheap. Interestingly I once had a garage door left open. An expensive mountain bike was stolen and they didn't bother taking my cheap piece of crap bike. [1]: https://www.durangoherald.com/articles/report-reveals-pipeline-of-stolen-colorado-bikes-ending-up-in-mexico/ https://www.durangoherald.com/articles/report-reveals-pipeli...
- roywashere 4y agoI live in NL. I had many bikes stolen over the years. Once my bike got stolen in the middle of the night in the city center. I searched for my bike the next day but could not find it. I reported it to the police, but did not expect much of it. About a week later I received a phone call from the police telling me someone found my bike. Apparently this person was woken up in the middle of the night by someone trying to break open the bike lock under his bedroom window. He scared away the thief. Because the lock was damaged he put the bike in his shed. He put notes in mailboxes of all his neighbors to ask if someone was missing their bike. He got no response and thought: oh I might just tell the police; but I doubt it will help much. Well it did! I was happy I reported it stolen that time.
- archi42 4y ago
- bckygldstn 4y agoThere's a Dutch bike company (VanMoof) that offers a Theft Recovery service for their bikes: they have teams of people that track down the bike (using GPS primarily) and basically steal it back. They used to produce monthly videos of bike recovery operations, though it looks like they've stopped the videos so you'll have to scroll past a few years of promo videos: https://www.youtube.com/@vanmoof https://www.youtube.com/@vanmoof Often they recover the bike from a yard / homeless camp / shop with 100s of other non-VanMoof bikes they leave behind. It would be so easy to crack down on organised bike theft. The financial, social, and environmental costs of securing bikes and recovering from a theft is huge.
- anonymouskimmer 4y agoI presume the researchers would have checked these 100 second-hand bikes for VanMoof trackers before equipping their own trackers?
- bckygldstn 4y agoAh to clarify: VanMoof make (very expensive) e-bikes with integrated GPS that's used mostly for "smart bike" features. I doubt the researchers could afford a used VanMoof for their study, and the company only tracks their own bikes. I'd guess part of their motivation is to dissuade theft and resale of their bikes, which are quite distinctive. Though that might be attributing too much rationality to a bike thief.
- blamazon 4y agoVanMoof is also responsible for the clever hack of disguising bicycle packaging as television packaging for shipment, as US carriers are much more careful with TV boxes than bicycle boxes: https://www.vanmoof.com/blog/en/tv-bike-box https://www.vanmoof.com/blog/en/tv-bike-box
- agumonkey 4y agoI might as well start a club doing that (or a company if I had the skills). Bike theft is such a sad load on bikers mind.. (even it can be cool to carry a 3kg chain to secure it.. not always)
- at-fates-hands 4y agoMinneapolis has been a hotbed of stolen bikes for a few years now. I remember several friends getting their high end dirt bikes stolen in the 80's, only to show up in a Chicago police auction two years later. There was an article in the local paper about bike thefts in 2019 and mentioned the Project 529 site which is one of the largest bike registries. https://project529.com/garage/ https://project529.com/garage/ From the 2019 article: Bike theft is at a five-year high, and Police Department data obtained by the Star Tribune shows almost 4,300 bikes reported stolen since 2017. The rash of thefts frustrates cyclists and police, who don’t always have time to track down stolen bikes amid other more serious calls. But for thieves, selling stolen bikes — some valued at more than $4,000 — can be a quick way to make hundreds of dollars. https://www.startribune.com/bicycle-thefts-hit-five-year-high-in-minneapolis/532952752/ https://www.startribune.com/bicycle-thefts-hit-five-year-hig... I had no idea someone had started a Facebook group for stolen bikes called "Twin Cities Stolen Bikes" where people can go and report their bike and ask for help.
- thenoblesunfish 4y agoThis would have been my guess, as someone who has had a couple of bikes stolen and has also bought a couple of used bikes.
- skrebbel 4y agoHahaha this is really some "why does water flow down" level shit. Bikes in NL get stolen by junkies, homeless, generally people without many options and definitely without the ability to do organized crime. They sell it asap, by circling around random people and saying "hey wanna buy a bike?" and then they buy whatever hit/food they needed to steal and sell the bike for. It's a pretty sad situation IMO, but it's no mystery. I know lots of people who bought their own bike back at some point in life, and even more who never bought a bike from anyone other than someone like this. Bike theft in NL really is the pettiest of petty crimes and I'm confused about what makes MIT, of all places, decide to try and figure this out.
- sasawpg 4y agoMaybe in NL, but in US/Canada organized bike theft is a bit more than "pettiest of petty crimes". For example: https://bikeindex.org/news/closing-the-loop-a-deep-dive-on-a-facebook-reseller-of-bikes-stolen-in https://bikeindex.org/news/closing-the-loop-a-deep-dive-on-a... A number of my friends have had $10-30k of bikes stolen. Based on the surrounding circumstances, at least some, if not most, were targeted by an organized set of individuals and not just random.
- magnuspaaske 4y agoOne of the things that make bike culture stick is that most bikes are just really cheap those places. On one hand this means they're protected relatively less and so would be rather easy to pick up, on the other it means no one bothers organising a theft ring as the returns are too low. Fancy bikes are something completely different and would attract another level of organised crime.
- asdff 4y agoI can't recommend enough putting your bikes on your renters or homeowners insurance. There is no lock that is cut proof, and even if there was, your components can just get stripped or the rack itself even could be cut. If you have insurance, however, its not even a couple bucks a month extra on my policy to get the bike on there for zero deductible coverage, and offers me a lot of piece of mind.
- denton-scratch 4y agoI had a £2,000 electric bike stolen in Oxford. No worries - it had a GPS tracker, and I could see it heading to Birmingham up the M40. Also, my neighbour had CCTV footage. You couldn't make out the faces or number-plate, but you could see it was a black Mercedes. It was taken at about 3AM. So they had "liberated" the bike (it was locked up), and immediately headed out of town. I'm sure it was scouted, then they came back in the small hours to steal it. I'm convinced that it was an organized operation, and the bike might have been stolen to order. When it stopped moving, I could see it was located in the back of a house in a Birmingham suburb. So I rang the Oxford police. They weren't interested - they told me to contact West Midlands police. So I rang them. No, they were not going to investigate: "Don't you realize how many Porsches are stolen in this city every day?" Also, they said they can't just walk in and have a look around (I guess they need a warrant, which is fair enough; but then why not get a warrant?) Like, I knew the address it was located at; so maybe the WM police would provide an officer to protect me, when I head up to Brum to collect the machine? No way. So I gave up. My replacement has no GPS tracker. So my experience seems to differ from the Amsterdam narrative. I had heard that most stolen bikes end up in Birmingham. My anecdote appears to confirm that bikes stolen in Oxford don't stay in Oxford.
- jamiek88 4y agoI’d have just gone and got it with ten of my mates. For real. Funny how upbringings are different. I grew up in a council estate in Liverpool and no way we’d stand for that shit we’d go to war. Your way is better.
- nerdponx 4y agoGood reminder that the assertion "police exist to protect private property" is incomplete. They protect certain private property, but in general not your private property.
- baremetal 4y agoAlso: you are not allowed to protect your own property. Call the police instead.
- barefootford 4y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz6Ade9PDzg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz6Ade9PDzg I put out a bait bike in San Francisco and was surprised how relatively straight forward it was to get it back. It's disappointing how few bike companies are installing trackers from the factory.
- no1groyp 4y agoNow do American cities
- ck2 4y agoWhat's the best guess as to how many people are stealing 25,000 bikes? 100? Only takes that many to wreck society? I mean once someone learns they are successful at stealing one without repercussions and reselling it, why would they stop and not turn it into a living? Now do a study on that somehow because I am really curious if it is 100 or 1,000
- ericmcer 4y agoI remember an article about a sewer tunnel in LA (or maybe Las Vegas) that was completely packed with 1000+ stolen bikes. Most of the bikes were rusted out and unusable, it seemed like whoever was stealing them had no plan beyond storing a ton of bikes in a hole.
- agumonkey 4y agofrench content: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnuz2WIQU5I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnuz2WIQU5I some women tracked her bike (it was a bait helped by a gps device company) and they uncovered a road from france to northern africa, it goes real quick
- spiritplumber 4y agoI caught a guy stealing a neighbor's bike and told him "Why don't we do this instead, I give you mine, and you never return because if you do I'll fry your eyeballs with an industrial laser", he took it, and I got an excuse to buy a new bike. (Not actually an industrial laser)
- p1esk 4y agoI can't imagine the situation you described. Was he just standing there having a conversation with you?
- spiritplumber 4y agoyes because he was in my neighbor's back yard and there was only one way out unless he could jump a 5' fence. not sure where my neighbor was at the time. she's a french teacher so this guy got off lucky that i got to him first, lol
- lotophage 4y agoWhat would she do to him? Make him conjugate irregular French verbs?
- spiritplumber 4y agoor worse!
- JALTU 4y agoThere is something about the Venn diagram of this e̶x̶p̶e̶r̶i̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ business that is perfect (at least in Seattle). I need help summarizing it: low COGS/resale value of parts/utility to channel partners/favorable legal conditions/favorable government policy... I'm missing the buyer side of this equation, but it has to be seriously compelling.
- adamrezich 4y agomy uncle bought a stolen bike from a bike-stealer-and-then-reseller in Taiwan in the 90s, brought it home with him when he went back to the US, and gave it to me when I moved to Redmond. I used it for a bit until the seat broke, after which it remained on the porch of my apartment, seatless, until someone stole it, apparently unperturbed by the lack of seat—I just figured it was karmic justice.
- JALTU 4y agoIn Seattle, they're on Craigslist. The thieves don't even bother to change the background of the photo (because heck, they don't need to!), but hey you can buy from a dealer who carries a wide variety of kids/road/mountain/etc.
- kyrra 4y agoThere is a wide sidewalk that runs under a four-lane road right next to my office. During COVID that underpass became a homeless camp and bike chop shop. When they reopen the office, I could sit and watch out the window as people were bringing bikes down there and was able to watch them take them apart for parts (presumably to sell). The cops obviously knew of it, as they would visit it regularly. The cops eventually shut it down and it took the city a couple weeks to fully clean it out of all the refuse that was built up.
- p0wn 4y agoI had my bikes stolen this year from Portland, OR. They were in Mexico on a craigslist like site within a week. Crazy crime rings happening now. Police don't do anything and FBI isn't going to get involved.
- guy98238710 4y agoLocal journalists (Bratislava, Slovakia) used these trackers to prove that some separated waste is being burned instead of being recycled. The company responsible for waste processing lost its contract with the city after the story was published. Trackers can be quite effective when used right.
- Scoundreller 4y agoI have a bridge to sell anyone that thinks plastics sent overseas are being recycled instead of incinerated for their caloric value.
- AtlasBarfed 4y agoWith the (hopefully) forthcoming ebike/escooter revolution, where you see china/netherlands small transportation/bicycle use in urban areas on a massive scale, the basic security issues of the bicycle-sized transport unit remain. It's a problem so old, some of the first auteur films in cinema, "Bicycle Thief" was based on that problem. If you can pick up something with your hands, how do you stop it from being so easily stolen? The ebike battery provides power and weight for the personal transport vehicle to incorporate keys, trackers, and a bit more weight so it can't be moved with a single hand, but still, the issue is out there: - we need embedded serial numbers in the major components (battery, frame) - tracking / pinging that can be turned on for theft tracking like they did here - removable batteries (recharge where you are, make the most valuable part of the e-vehicle more securable) - integrated U-lock that isn't so effing annoying to use (cryptographic key on your phone) and isn't easily defeated by liquid nitrogen or other means well, yeah, and make it cheap. I think there's a lot of opportunity for innovation in these platforms to solve/counter these age-old bicycle thief problems. But a lot of it might be to get municipal policing policy to address them under the (flawed, but not totally) broken window theory. Take bicycle and ebike theft more seriously, it will help enable the transformation of cities in safety, use, convenience, and environmental efficiency.
- ajp11 4y agoIn the summer of 1997, I was sitting in the center of Amsterdam enjoying the sunshine on a warm bright afternoon. I saw a man wearing a wooly jumper walk up to a bike rack, pull out a pair of bolt cutters, snip a lock and ride away. When I passed through Amsterdam for the first time I recall looking at the many bikes at the bike racks and thinking how old fashioned they all looked, I think it is still the same now.
- lumberjack24 4y agoTo Casablanca, Morocco.
- guywithahat 4y agoWhy would you not pursue criminal investigation with this? Seems like a moral hazard, otherwise you're just funding criminals with government money
- JackAndJack 4y agoFor all who are up in arms about police not doing their job. It is almost always the same crowd, that boo the officers for doing their job when they have to use force. Guess people are afraid to go in rough neighborhood to retrieve their own property and police is not coming with them because they know they will have to use force to get job done. And when they actually use force, everyone including those whose property is stolen go up in arms, how can you do use that force? That is the simple reason police does not care. In cities like Baltimore and Minneapolis they even ignore shootings and murder because of woke agenda in the city as they know they will be punished for doing their jobs. Well, may this be a lesson for those whose property is stolen and those who are shocked by no response from police, that going in rough parts of town and meeting criminals does not go very well with please and thankyou. You should be ready and willing to use force which most of the times is necessary.
- girvo 4y ago> It is almost always the same crowd, that boo the officers for doing their job when they have to use force. I disagree, and think it’s quite telling that you feel this way. Most people I know would love for the police to do their job and use the force that they and only they are authorised to use (here in Aus) to retrieve stolen private property. But they don’t. Best they’ll do is file a report so you can claim it on insurance if you’re lucky enough to have it.
- satyajitrai 4y agoI grew up in a village in India with most people with very low income but pretty large population around. I almost never heard of a bike theft. I wonder why places like US and Netherlands have such large incidents of bike theft?
- xrd 4y agoI was reading this article and thinking the same thing. My friend had an expensive electric bike. It got stolen. He's a teacher but his wife is a well paid doctor. He posted somewhere that the bike was stolen. Surprisingly, someone contacted him and told him they found it. It was really strange the way the "finder" offered to return it. They had them meet them in another suburb 30 minutes away. They requested a substantial reward. The whole thing was strange. It makes me think that there are people who live in a grey economy that steal bikes because they aren't hurting someone in the same way that breaking into a house or stealing a car would hurt someone (or worse). Bikes are a luxury good at the high end, and that's what my friend lost. Bike thievery is a gateway to a decent income when you have no other choices. At least that's what it seemed like when my friend had that experience. It seemed like it was a well thought out scam that was done by someone with intelligence and desperation.
- bendbro 4y agoI don't think we need to be shaming people for having equity emergencies. We can assume these bikes will be sold to fund self administered mental health treatment, food, rent, or college.
- blhack 4y agoI had a bike stolen at burning man, and it ended up in NEW ZEALAND! I couldn't believe it. I was able to track it for a little while via the tile app, but it eventually stopped being available. Would have been such a cool story to get it back. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/kiwis-on-a-mission-to-find-electric-bike-stolen-at-burning-man-that-ended-up-in-new-zealand/C52G4Y3UD2STGSA4M3SNUQNY6I/ https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/kiwis-on-a-mission-to-find-ele...
- zeruch 4y agoBased on volume, I'd guess the UC Davis campus...
- johnnyApplePRNG 4y agoI bought something from a police auction aggregator business in Ontario once and when I went into the location to pick it up I got a chance to chat with the owner briefly. I mentioned how many bikes I saw on hand, and he proudly told me that since his inception about 20 years ago he had auctioned off more than 1 MILLION stolen bicycles. 1 million stolen bikes, retrieved by police in Ontario alone in the past 20 years. That's incredible. Imagine how many bikes have been stolen and not recovered by the police.
- fuzzfactor 4y ago>Where do stolen bikes go? Law enforcement had more in one place than I ever saw. Going to police auctions probably the thing they have the most of is recovered bikes that had never been returned to their owners. And the buyers were regulars, many pawnbrokers who you could tell normally purchase continuously directly from thieves, picking them up super cheap in quantity whenever the cops do have them on offer. And the cops completely aware the whole time. At a different time, I was a theft victim from a music rehearsal space, where a guy left town with some of our nice gear when I was on vacation. Leaving behind some of his ratty things, but people figured out who he was right away, then found some pawn tickets and a couple were my items. I went to that pawnshop and they had not loaned him much so I just bought them back. But there were two big speakers and one amp that I had no ticket for and a couple other guys were victims too. We made police reports with our serial numbers and the cops said they have a good relationship with the pawnbrokers and a very effective system to see if any recent loans were documented to these exact items. Everything was by the book. One guy did get a speaker back that the cops found in a different pawnshop, but I kept checking for months and my stuff never turned up. Until a couple years later when I got a call from a detective who wanted evidence on that same perpetrator in a more serious crime. Turned out the cops had my recovered amplifier for quite some time, and it was about to be auctioned off and surely he knew it would go cheap. But he wanted to know the original purchase prices so he could file enhanced charges needed to apprehend the thief immediately. I gave him the information and he faxed me the paperwork I needed to pick up my amp from their property department before the deadline. I was well aware that if this new violation had not come up, I would never have seen my amp again. Never did find the speakers until a couple more years later I was watching a new band play at a local joint and sure enough, they had these uncommon series speakers right up front, and I discreetly checked them out and it was surely the ones my brother bought when he was a teenager and I had been deeply familiar with for years, with distinctive wear & tear. That I had faxed the original receipt to the cops that time. But I decided not to say anything because it was a good band, and they were making better use of them than we would be doing by then. Plus they had replaced the horns with some more professional grade, these stout old boxes were sounding better than ever.
- pastaguy1 4y agoI've definitely spent some time thinking about it, or did in college anyway. There's a lot going on with the typical bike population on a college campus. A fair amount of bikes get stolen on the way home from a party or whatever, and left in a shrubbery or whatever. These bikes tend to get picked up by the school and sold at the reuse store. Some bikes have probably done that loop more than once, especially because these bikes are often not so great, and the line between "stolen" and "community" blurs a bit. Unregistered/expired bikes also end up in the reuse store, which is also pretty common.
- sunjester 4y agoI did not read the article. I do know that stolen bikes, when I was a kid, was auctioned off by the local police.
- Lio 4y agoOne of the reasons I bought a Brompton folding bike is so that I can take it with me instead of leaving it locked up. I’ve had funny looks from bored security guards but so far it’s always worked.
- mlatu 4y agoSweden, Uppsala, Main station... or at least thats how it looked like last time i visited
- cocodill 4y agoSo my stolen bike went via Poland to the Ukraine's Lviv, where it was probably disassembled because the traces of the tracker are disappearing.
- justsomehnguy 4y agoI saw a post recently about a bike stolen in Germany ended up in Khakrov.
- victorthehuman 4y agoHigh-end eMTB bikes that are stolen in western Europe end up here in eastern Europe, the usual retail price is around the 1000-3000 euro mark, that's less than half their original price for bikes in almost new condition. There are dedicated organizations that do these runs across Europe, to keep a low profile a wan with only 4 bikes will cross the border at a time. The profits must be good enough to keep selling the bikes at half the price and continue doing these runs.
- scotty79 4y agoWe bought two used bicycles in Amsterdam. Guy we bought it from looked a bit sketchy and had like 20-30 bikes in a spot near his home. Most of them were in pretty bad condition but we could pick the ones we liked. I had a strong suspicion that some of them could be stolen. But hey, they were priced at 30 euros not 100 like new ones. When we left Amsterdam few months later we sold them (bit cheaper) to another couple of young probably tourists so they went back into the ecosystem.
- scotty79 4y agoSince police does nothing and reasonable protections can be fairly easily circumvented I think that the best approach to property theft is just budget it into you life. If the stuff you've got stolen of you since you were born are worth less than two times your last months salary than you are good. If not then ask yourself if you really earn enough to be buying such expensive things.