UNM p0wnz a bike thief using coffee cup, DNA

Apparently the UNM campus police don't mess around:

Discarded Coffee Cup Leads To Bike Thief's Arrest:

University of New Mexico police say 52-year-old Joseph Gutierrez had been stealing bikes on the university's campus for at least a year and a half. He now sits in jail, and bikes on the UNM campus are a little more safe.

Cops say Gutierrez is suspected of stealing more than a dozen bikes from campus, and they can positively tie him to at least seven stolen bikes that are worth more than $7,000.

They say one student actually witnessed his bike being stolen by Gutierrez and saw him set down a coffee cup. Police used that cup to link Gutierrez through DNA.

Another victim saw his bike for sale on eBay through a local pawn shop, where police say Gutierrez fenced the bikes.

Here's a video from KOB.com

BikePortland.org's SBR plugin nabs a nice one!

From bikeportland.org's "Bike Thief Foiled By Technology, Community"

James Selman ... listed his one-of-a-kind, custom black Seven Cycles Tsunami singlespeed (with estimated value of $4,600) on June 29th.

According to Selman, someone threw a baseball-sized rock through the glass door of his office in Northwest Portland. The smash-and-grabbers grabbed his Apple laptop and rode off on his bike.

Selman immediately listed the bike on BikePortland. Then, on July 10th he got an email from a guy named Joe in Northeast Portland. It read, “Your bike is in front of my apartment building, in the possession of a skeezy dude. I have called police…”

According to Selman, Joe had heard the suspect bragging about the bike a week prior (must have been right after he stole it). This time, when Joe saw the bike, he pulled out his iPhone and checked our listings. Selman’s detailed description was an exact match. “So, while he [Joe] stalled the guy,” Selman told us, “he emailed me and called the cops.”

I cannot express how much I love this story, and how stoked I am that the SBR plug-in that I wrote for BikePortland.org nailed this idiot.

This, coming right on the heels of this news about the guy who was ripping off bikes in the Pearl district being sentenced for three charges make it a pretty good week for the good guys.

Yaaaay!

One Good Story, One Bad Story

For every good bike recovery we have, there's always a bad story to balance it out.

First, the good story:

Email: hello - looking at the stolen bike registry today, I noticed that I have your Sun recumbent in my possession. It was purchased by myself ... on July 18, 2008. ... My intention was to restore it and possibly give it over to my old man. It has been sitting like this for a while - an unfinished project. If you're still needing this bike, please send over your phone # so we can arrange an exchange.


Bike owner: Cool! That bike was primary transport for my stepson who has cerebral palsy -- which was why the brakes were modified. He only has use of his left hand. The bike was stolen from his place of work right out in front of the store in broad daylight.

I'm a big fan of this kind of recovery, because this bike has been on file for a while, and the owner actually had valid contact info - so it's a piece of cake to hook this up and scratch one off the list. A couple of emails, and this bike was returned. Yay!


Now for the bad one:

My name is (redacted), from the Netherlands. I was riding the US Coast to Coast tour on my bicycle. My plan was to end the trip in Astoria, OR. Unfortunately on Friday, July 10th, 2009 around 4:00 PM my bike, which was locked, was stolen from the front side of the Eugene, OR Public Library, 100 West10th Avenue, Eugene. Please contact me on e-mail I you might have information on my bike.

Bike specifications:
Make: Idworx, type Off Rohler
Frame ID: GK771051
Wheels front: SON dynamo hub with 26" Rim Rigida CSS
rear: Rohloff Speedhub 500/14, Rim Mavic
Brakes: Magura HS 33 Firm-tech
Tires: Schwalbe Marathon Extreme
Handlebar: Syntace VRO, adjustable handlebar system
Bags: Vaude panniers, silver colered (front, rear), Ortlieb Rack top bag, yellow.

To the asshat in Eugene, OR that stole this poor guy's bike - there is such a thing as karma, and you're pretty much F'd. Pray that we don't find you.

p.s. KMTR in Eugene picked this story up, too, possibly after I posted this to CL.

p.p.s now there is a video, from KPTV

Local registries are popping up like crazy

From "Bike Theft Deterrent Hits Web":

Memo to all bike thieves: The Hub is unveiling a new program today that will send out a virtual APB on social networking sites Twitter and Facebook whenever a bicycle is reported stolen in Boston. Bike owners are being asked to log onto a new city Web site, stolenbikesboston.com, to register the make, model, year, color and serial number of their bicycles, and upload pictures.

The site, stolenbikesboston.com, is also doing Twitter integration, which is interesting because I've been watching BikePortland.org's stolen bikes twitter feed for a while and it now has something like 127 followers. Lots of eyes out there looking for people's stolen rides!

At some point in the future I need to sit down and work out a specification that would let all of these various stolen bike registries 'talk' to each other and exchange data. It's going to be a problem if all these various Balkanized registries can't cross-check serial numbers with other websites, since more and more bikes are being shipped out of town for resale.

If I had any extra time on my plate, I'd put together a working group, but for now it'll have to wait. If you're out there and would be interested in working on such a project - especially landing some money to make it happen - drop me a line.