Now that doesn't happen every day ...

Email to me this morning:

((redacted))@((redacted)), sent to me for the owner of bike 4314:
Could this bike be yours?: http://boulder.craigslist.org/bik/1238666942.html

My reply:

Thanks for the heads up. I have bcc:'d the registrant of bike #4314
here so they can check it out.
-bhance
-SBR

Response about two hours later:

((redacted))@((redacted))
I'll be looking at the bike later today and will check the serial number

Response about three hours later:

((redacted))@((redacted))
I had the police meet me when I met the seller, and the police found that it was indeed stolen out of Ft. Collins, CO. But it wasn't the one that was shown on your website

Me:

Oh man, wow. Score one for you :) Nice find!
-bhance
-SBR

A thousand little registries, blooming

There's a few new bike registries popping up on the radar:

I recently wrapped up a WordPress plugin for BikePortland.org that lets people in Portland, Oregon register and list their stolen bikes in a small, bikeportland.org-local registry. Their bikes are then cross-listed in the SBR for better searching and recovery power!

I'm still beating the stupid out of the plugin (and if you've never tried WordPress plugin programming before, I suggest you start drinking before you do just to help ease the transition) but it has a lot of promise. Big ups to BikePortland for hooking the thing up and adding all kinds of Wordpress kung-fu, like Twitter integration. That's right - there's now a damn twitter page for stolen bikes in Portland, over at stolenbikespdx!

It also looks like the city of Austin, Texas will be hand-rolling their own local registry. There's a post up about this oncoming initiative over at the always-awesome ATXBS.com:

The City of Austin, Austin Police Department and the Public Works Department are in the process of implementing an educational campaign to foster camaraderie between the cycling communities and to assist in the safety awareness to cyclists, citizens and motorists. City departments have begun to examine ways to implement a voluntary web-based program that would be accessible to all users containing information on reporting bicycle thefts, registration, and safety procedures.

I spoke with a policy aide from Austin a while back about this and I'm way happy to see them moving forward with the idea. Individual cities and towns are much better equipped to handle things like 'pre-registration', i.e. registrations for bikes that haven't been stolen yet. And they're more prone to getting their own cops and other local law-enforcement types involved in the process, which is a huge help at the local level. And, hey, the more registries == more recovered bikes.

The one thing I've always asked people to do if they're going to go build a registry is to bake some interoperability into their system, so everybody's registries can 'talk' to one another. That way, if someone runs a serial number in the SBR, my website can 'ask' the city of Austin website if it has any bikes on file with the same serial.

This is actually a pretty easy thing to do (XML! API's! INTERNETS!!oneone!!111) and it prevents the 'balkanization' of whatever registries come online - and more importantly, it greatly increases the chance of getting your bikes back.

Finding your stolen bike on Craigslist

I had an email a while back from Ian at NotifyWire.com, and I finally got a chance this weekend to sit down and put some thoughts together on his Craigslist search tool.

Notifywire, as you may have guessed, helps you scan Craigslist via a small client you run on your computer. Searches can also be saved as 'alerts', and you can tell Notifywire to drop you a line via text message/SMS whenever a new hit on one of your searches pops up. It's also easy to expand your searches to multiple cities, which is incredibly important when looking for stolen bikes - we've seen time and time again how many bikes pop up two or three major cities away.

There's a pretty comprehensive demo on Youtube that you can watch, too, that explains NotifyWire.com much better than I can.

From my perspective, this is a great tool for anyone looking to find their stolen bike on Craigslist. And, let's be clear on this - a lot of stolen bikes wind up on Craigslist. So many that I've all but stopped posting about stupid thieves getting caught on Craigslist, and only post the fantastic stories like Michelle's epic recovery, and those crafty Austin bike folks who both nailed bike thieves using CL.

I've been playing with NotifyWire for about a week now, using it to scan Seattle, Portland, and other Pacific Northwest listings for my friend's stolen Dahon. I've been pretty happy with it, it's a good flagger and easy to use after a couple of trial runs. And while I started out using Notifywire to look for bikes, I'll admit it, I started putting some searches together for cheap computer gear that I'm looking for. So it has definitely become another great tool to have in the toolbox, so to speak.

Ian gets another shout out for putting together a blog post titled "Finding Your Stolen Property Online", which includes a fantastic Youtube video showing you how to scan for your stolen stuff using Notifywire. (And yes, he drops a gratuitous link and some info about the the SBR in there, which is always appreciated. Thanks Ian!)

Long story short: If you're serious about finding your stolen bike, check out NotifyWire.com. And tell Ian I sent you!

Hey! Look! Two more idiots nailed on Craigslist

Remember folks: If your bike gets stolen, keep checking Craigslist. From "Police Recover High-End Bikes":

Santa Rosa Junior College student Nica Poznanovich was heartbroken when she came out of class last Wednesday and found her prized racing bike gone...But she was back in the saddle Tuesday after Santa Rosa police broke up an alleged theft ring that was advertising stolen bikes on Craigslist.

Her $2,000 Bianchi bicycle was part of a cache of bikes recovered Tuesday when police arrested two Santa Rosa men and searched a home and storage unit.

Santa Rosa and SRJC police investigating a recent rash of bike thefts learned that someone was selling the stolen property on Craigslist, according to Santa Roa Police Sgt. Lisa Banayat... undercover detectives made arrangements to buy one of the advertised bikes and met Tuesday with two men, who also brought a second stolen bike, Banayat said.

Police arrested Mark Allen Jensen, 20, and Donald Andrew Bean, 18, both of Santa Rosa, on felony charges of possessing stolen property...Detectives then searched a home on Earle Street and a storage unit on Santa Rosa Avenue, finding more bikes and bike parts related to 14 different theft cases.

I can't tell you how common this is becoming - so I say again - if your bike gets stolen, keep on Craigslist. There are even Craigslist scanning tools like NotifyWire that will even do it for you, and send you a text message when it matches your searches.

Also, don't forget to check Craigslist for towns that are within a day's drive of your own - I have dozens of cases over at the SBR where people were stealing bikes in, say, Seattle, and then driving them down to Portland to sell. So expand your searches.

Another Craigslist idiot nailed.

.... and the theif's ad - including his phone number - is still up on Craigslist. Woohoo!

From "Craigslist Ad Leads Bellingham Police To Alleged Bike Thieves"

BELLINGHAM — Two Bellingham men were arrested Thursday, May 7, after police discovered the pair had been stealing bicycles and selling them on Craigslist.

The investigation began when a woman, whose mountain bike had been stolen, told Bellingham Police she thought she saw the bicycle for sale on Craigslist, said Mark Young, police spokesman. An officer went to the Web site, tracked down the listing and ... called the phone number provided in the listing and set up a time with the seller to buy the bike.

The officer drove an unmarked patrol car to a local shopping center where he met Jeremy Randall Schuitema, 22, who came to the meeting riding the bike, Young said. The officer checked the serial number, which matched that of the woman’s missing mountain bike.

Schuitema was arrested. Further investigation led police to take David Jordan McDonough, 19, into custody as well, Young said. The pair eventually led police to their apartment where five other stolen bikes were found. All of the bikes were impounded as evidence.

I, personally like how this idiot's Craigslist ad - including his phone number - is still online. Way to go, genius.

You also have to love this idiot's added linguistic flair:

Bike is SICK! In great condition and has nothing wrong with it, im only selling cause i have a baby on the way and need the money

Yeah. You go, winner.

Here's an interesting blip

Here's an interesting blip, from "Allston man stole bikes, locked them to Cambridge parking meters"

... detectives believe Cartagena used bolt cutters to steal the bicycles off city streets and then moved the bikes to other locations, locking them to meters and street signs with his own bike locks while he waited to sell the stolen goods.

...detectives allegedly noticed Cartagena had two sets of key rings with numerous keys on them, according to reports.... Cartagena gave police the key rings and Detective Mui used the keys to open another lock on a bike tied to a street sign in the area of Hovey and Magnolia avenues... Detective Mui told the Chronicle he walked around the area with Cartagena’s keys for several hours and was able to unlock nine more bikes.

Note the use of stash/drop spots and the fact that this guy had multiple keys and bolt cutters. There's actually a quick blip in the video that contains a shot of this guy's uber-keyring.

The multiple-keys thing doesn't pop up that often, but it would be worth looking into lock variation among manufacturers, i.e. how effective this actually is. If it were, the guy wouldn't need the bolt cutters.

Also, here's a video from wickedlocal.com:

Cambridge detectives bust thief with 12 high-end bikes from Erin Smith on Vimeo.

Score One For Us

From "Tempe Campus Bike Thief Sentenced To State Prison":

An Arizona judge sentenced a 49-year-old Phoenix man to more than three years in state prison last week for theft and trafficking of bicycles stolen from ASU’s Tempe campus, ASU Police Cmdr. Jim Hardina said on Monday.

Donald George Candea was arrested on Feb. 26 after ASU student James Weiser located his own stolen bike on Craiglist and helped to thwart a trafficking operation on campus.

Following on the heels of Michelle's epic Craigslist recovery (which got a nice fat mention in The Stranger) it has been a good couple of weeks for catching thieves ...

Also, thanks to Marti for pointing me towards The Problem of Bicycle Theft, from the Center for Problem-Oriented Policing.

It's pretty hard to nail down a well-written, comprehensive look at the bike theft problem - let alone find one with references - which is why this is my favorite link for a while. Covers everything from locking schemes to RFID to registries. Good stuff.